Landline woes cost Bognor bookshop owner thousands in lost trade

The historic bookshop moved from High Street to a larger venue in the railway station on May 22, citing a need for more space.

Owner Jason Passingham planned to reopen on May 31 but a lack of broadband connectivity made doing so impossible.

Mr Passingham said he needs the connectivity to research stock and accept credit card transactions. Being without it, he said, has cost him several thousand pounds in lost trade over the last five and a half weeks.

Clear Business, Mr Passingham’s service provider relies on Openreach to proivde the lines they use to deliver a service. They apologised for the delay and said Openreach has since installed a phone line.

Mr Passinghasm, however, said the phone line has been assigned the wrong number, and that the number he has been given has not yet been activated.

“It just felt like everything was against me because obviously the cost of moving isn’t cheap,” he said “my plan was to get back open and trading as soon as possible, but a phone line is the one thing you don’t realise how much you need until you need it.”