BT plans to answer 80% of customer calls in UK service centres by next year

Since 2003 BT has used call centres in Bangalore and New Delhi

Telecommunications giant BT didn't fare well (Getty Images)

BT has pledged to answer 80 per cent of customer calls in UK call centres by 2016.

The communications service provider, which has over 10 million UK customers, has created over 1,000 new jobs in the UK in order to achieve this goal.

Plans to create hundreds of other customer call centre positions in the UK over the next year are also in place.

Currently 50 per cent of BT calls are answered in the UK.

The new plan comes as part of BT's improvement to services which also includes providing dedicated relationship managers to support customers with complex issues, and offering more online support with the My BT customer service app.

John Petter, chief executive of BT Consumer, said: "Our customers have told us that they would prefer to speak to a contact centre in the UK when they call us."

BT Mobile, which launched earlier this year, uses UK-based customer service which "customers have valued", according to BT.

"Our offshore partners have provided a good level of service for our customers and we will still have offshore partners to help us to deliver various campaigns and services," Mr Petter said.

"However, we believe that now is the right time to commit more investment to the UK and that this is something that customers will appreciate."

Some of the Indian offices will remain open to complete other work which does not involve answering customer calls, BT said.

In 2009 BT halted plans to bring 2,000 call centre jobs back to the UK over disagreement about working hours where staff in Britain were required to work until 11pm to provide the same hours as call centres in India.