A phone company will be holding events in Dorset to raise awareness of the change from analogue to digital phone lines.

BT will be holding events this September to help raise awareness of the change from analogue to digital landlines by the end of January 2027. 

The company will talk to customers about how landlines will be changing over the coming years. This will include the steps affected customers will need to take and the support available.

Neighbourhood Watch, who have teamed up with BT to help raise awareness of the switchover, will also be hosting a number of engagement events throughout Dorset from the start of September until March 2025.

Moving customers to digital phonelines – which, for most customers, will see calls made over a broadband line – is being prioritised urgently by telecoms providers as the 40-year-old analogue landline technology is becoming increasingly fragile.

The BT events include:

  • Weymouth: September 3, 10:00 to 14:00 - Weymouth Library & Learning Centre, Great George Street, Weymouth, DT4 8NN
  • Shaftesbury: September 12, 08:30 to 14:30 - Shaftesbury Market, Town Centre, Shaftesbury, SP7 8JW

Engagement Events hosted by Neighbourhood Watch include:

  • Dorchester: September 4, 10:00 to 13:00 - Dorchester Meeting Room, Dorchester Library, DT1 1QG
  • Sherborne: November 7, 10:00 to 13:00 - Sherborne Library, DT9 3AA

Vicky Hicks, Senior Engagement Manager at BT, said: “We will be visiting Dorset in September to speak to our customers face-to-face and answer any questions they may have about the essential upgrade from analogue to digital landlines.

“The landline is here to stay, and for the majority of customers, making the switch simply means plugging your phone into a broadband router instead of into a wall-mounted phone socket. This will bring new benefits like advanced spam call blocking. On average, we prevent 15,000 scam calls a day from reaching our customers.

“Most of our customers won’t experience much of a difference in their service when they make the switch.”

For more information visit: https://www.bt.com/digital-voice