Government has “seen sense” pausing the rollout of digital landlines across Dorset
The rollout of digital landlines to homes across Dorset has been pushed back over worries raised by Age UK
Plans to replace traditional analogue landlines with digital landlines across Dorset have been put on pause due to concerns over potential power cuts.
This means services that rely on the old landline system such as home phones and healthcare devices will be switched over.
However, Age UK argued the move would prevent elderly people from using their fall monitor or restrict their ability to call emergency services during a power cut.
Age UK representative, Simon Clifford told us: “We know a lot of elderly people that are not for the change and think they’ll need someone to sit down with them and explain how the new system works.
“This initiative is putting the onus on elderly people to step up themselves and we don’t think that’s fair.
“There has been a huge change to digital technology over the past 10 years and elderly people tend to be the ones who are forgotten.”
The original plan was to move customers off analogue landlines and over to the new technology by the end of the year.
But Age UK believe the switchover should only be carried out once solutions have been put in place that will protect elderly people.
Mr Clifford said: “The other big concern we have is despite the actual move protecting people from scammers in the long-term, it does open an opportunity for scammers during the course of the move.
“People might take advantage of the fact there's a big national programme being rolled out and start ripping people off.”
According to reports, criminals are already exploiting the analogue to digital switchover to scam vulnerable residents who use health care telephony devices into giving out personal information such as bank details.