Essex residents left without electricity in the wake of the storms which lashed Essex have been urged to apply for compensation by the power industry watchdog.

Energywatch said customers cut off for more than 18 hours after the county was battered by rain and high winds on Wednesday, could claim £50 and claim a further £25 if power was not restored for another 12 hours after that

Supplies to an estimated 6,000 Essex homes the majority in rural areas were affected by the storms.

A spokeswoman for EDF Energy said 1,650 were still without electricity by 1pm yesterday and 530 customers were still without power in the county by 4pm

But by this morning, EDF Energy reported that all customers in North Essex had been reconnected.

The spokeswoman said: "We had been in close contact with the Met Office and placed staff on standby earlier in the week in anticipation of yesterday's poor weather."

She said an estimated 75,000 customers were affected in East Anglia after the bad weather, which started on Wednesday morning, and power was restored to 90 per cent of these customers within three hours.

Published Friday July 9, 2004

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