There were complaints of breakdowns in the telephone system yesterday from of ISME, the small businesses' association, and angry telephone users in the southeast who claimed they were connected to other parts of the country when they dialed local number. Some people were connected to telephones as far away as Leitrim and Donegal.
ISME called on the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, Ms O'Rourke, to initiate an urgent inquiry into recent breakdowns of the system. ISME said subscribers in parts of south Dublin had been experiencing difficulty in getting connected to landlines since Thursday.
In less than seven days the country's telecommunications network had "gone mad again", the ISME chairman, Mr Shay Fitzmaurice, said last night, adding "How can Ireland claim to be at the forefront of e-commerce and telecommunications and attempt inward investment when the country's primary telecoms provider cannot guarantee a service compatible with business needs?"
Eircom rejected any responsibility for failures and said the system was operating without any problems.