Callers to Braintree Council were left hanging on the line after the local authority's phone system collapsed.

Residents trying to get through to the council were left frustrated and angry with either a continuous engaged tone or a recorded message urging callers to please try later.

The phones were out of action for about 30 hours.

The problems started on Tuesday morning when all but a few lines into Causeway House and the emergency care lines went dead leaving officers and council workers unable to phone out.

The council called in communications firm Siemens, who designed their internal system, but they could not find any faults. It was later discovered that the problem lay with the incoming lines which had led to a breakdown in the internal system.

The council were finally reconnected to the phone system at about 4pm on Wednesday afternoon.

Chris Trim, spokesman for the council, said: "Until we begin to get some feedback from the different council services we won't be able to access the level of frustration it has caused.

"It may make us think again about what kind of arrangements we need in place but it was amazing how many employees were using their mobile phones."

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.