Amerada launches domestic telecoms service

Amerada, the UK gas and electricity provider, is launching a telecoms service.

The service, which will be rolled out to all Amerada’s domestic customers, will charge 5p less per minute for national daytime calls than BT’s standard service. It will also be 1p less than the BT Together service, and British Gas.

Amerada, which is the sponsor of Carlton TV’s London TV report, launched its electricity service in September last year.

The company says it is able to offer the additional service after buying a “small telecommunications company”, although it would not reveal any details about the purchase or the name of the company acquired.

Amerada marketing manager Jenny Brownlee says that research by Datamonitor shows that by 2004 over half of UK homes will take more than two services from their utility company.

She says: “More consumers are seeking the convenience and simplicity of one single supplier for all their utilities. Amerada wants to offer customers the same competitive price on their phone bills that they have come to expect from Amerada on gas and electricity.”

Customers will be connected to Amerada’s phone service via a box that plugs into their existing BT line socket.

Amerada, which is owned by oil and gas giant Amerada Hess Corporation, was launched in the UK in 1996 following deregulation of the utilities market.