Electricity bosses today apologised to a Canvey couple who had to take their new born baby home to a freezing house with no electricity.

British Gas admitted its delayed response to several calls the couple made to the company.

The apology comes after David and Tanya Bone of Cedar Road, Canvey, first tried to put credit on their electricity meter but found the key to be faulty.

Then 24 hours later Mrs Bone, 28, went into labour and was taken to Southend Hospital and there was still no sign of a replacement key - despite promises from British Gas that one would arrive.

Mrs Bone's mother-in-law rang British Gas repeatedly over the next two days and was told that the couple's meter had to be under 50p for them to call an engineer out - their credit was 67p.

The family were assured that the emergency number they had been given would be answered when they rang, but when British Gas said they would send an engineer out within four hours.

Mrs Bone said: "I had just come out of hospital, it was a nightmare.

"I couldn't go home I had to go and stay with other people."

British Gas today apologising to the family and said it will investigate why the emergency numbers the family was given were not answered.

A spokesman added: "Sometimes the keys do go wrong and we have a threshold at which we send out engineers, but in this case we should have considered it more of an emergency and been more flexible."

Published Tuesday, April 15, 2003

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