Red box payphone in Laggan will be fixed soon

BT has pledged to repair the public payphone in Laggan as soon as possible.

The kiosk by the village's Gergask Primary School is currently out of order and community leaders had feared it had been disconnected by the telecoms giant.

It is understood that a BT engineer is scheduled to visit the box next week to fix the technical issue.

A BT spokesperson explained: “This payphone has had very little use which has meant the battery has run low. It has not been decommissioned.

“Separately, we had been consulting on the payphone’s removal.

"However, we have listened to the community and will not be removing it.

“We also thank Laggan Community Council for alerting us to the issue with the phone, as the fault hadn’t been reported to us. We’ll get the phone fixed as soon as possible.

"To report a fault or damage to any of our payphones, call 0800 661 610 or email customer.serv.payphones@bt.com ”

Colin Morgan, chairman of Laggan Community Council, said: "We are pleased that BT has confirmed that the local telephone kiosk is now not to be decommissioned.

"This will be welcomed by the community and the many walkers who may need to use this particular phone.”

The message to would-be callers had stated 'payphone not commissioned' and there was no ring tone prompting concerns from village community leaders that it had been taken out of public use.

BT recently carried out a public consultation on payphone removals in the Highlands – the second in little more than a year.

As part of this, the company wanted to axe every remaining kiosk – 14 in total – in Badenoch and Strathspey.

However, local objections to these proposed losses were supported by Highland Council which exercised its local veto under Ofcom rules to safeguard them for now.

The other public phones at risk were in Aviemore (Dalfaber, Milton Park and Grampian Road); Carrbridge, Kincraig, Kingussie, Newtonmore, Ralia, Glenmore, Cairngorm Mountain, Grantown, Cromdale and Tomintoul.

There were 84 objections made against the proposed closures in the strath.

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