No warning for planned power cut costs Lindfield business thousands

While houses affected by a planned cut in Lewes Road, Lindfield on Friday morning received a warning letter from UK Power Networks, Enterprise Park did not, and the factories and offices were left in the dark.

Harbeth Audio, one of the export firms affected by the blackout, estimated that thousands of pounds of business was lost as a result of the hour-long power cut.

Trevor Butler, of the speaker company, said: “If we’d have known, we could have planned for it and told staff to come in earlier.”

“As it was, we had them sitting around idle as it wasn’t safe to work in the dark doing those jobs that don’t need power.

“As it is, it’s affected shipments to Spain and Japan as we didn’t know how long we’d be left without any power.”

Some of the estate’s businesses, which he described as ‘furious’, are seeking compensation from the power company for the disruption caused.

A spokesman from UK Power Networks said they would like to apologise to customers in the Lewes Road area of Lindfield after their electricity supplies were interrupted without warning.

“We appreciate how difficult it can be to lose power,” the statement said.

“Our engineers have been upgrading the low-voltage overhead electricity lines in the area and power had to be interrupted so they could work as quickly and as safely as possible.”

The interruption was scheduled to last from about 9am to noon but supplies were restored at 10.18am, earlier than anticipated.The statement continued: “Some customers in the area did receive advance warning, as is required by our industry standards. However, some did not and for this we apologise.

“Our customer service team will be phoning those who were not contacted to further apologise and to listen to any concerns. We will also be sending them a letter.”

Fine Furnishings in Enterprise Park were also surprised to be sent into darkness. They were fully staffed and operational and had no warning for the blackout.