A SERVICE to crack down on nuisance calls has been launched by a phone company.

BT announced it was "declaring war" on companies which regularly pester Redditch and Bromsgrove residents with calls about PPI, personal accident claims and computer scams.

The free BT Call Protect service - which will be rolled out to customers across the UK - uses technology to identify 'rogue numbers' and divert nuisance calls to a junk voicemail box.

Top offending nuisance callers will be added to a 'BT blacklist' and diverted before they even reach a customer, while people can also compile their own blacklist.

It is thought the service could divert up to 30 million nuisance calls a week – preventing them from irritating residents.

Colin Bannon, chairman of BT’s West Midlands regional board, said: "This new service is great news for people in the Midlands.

"We know that nuisance calls are a big problem for people in our region, who receive many millions of such calls every year.

"Some of these calls can be upsetting and unnerving as well as very annoying, particularly for people who are more vulnerable perhaps through age or disability.

"We take this issue very seriously and, as this important new service demonstrates, are determined to do everything we can to help our customers beat the problem."

The latest research carried out for BT shows that in the Midlands on average people receive between three and four nuisance calls a week.