BT to Close Older UK Contact Centres in Accrington, Blackburn and Doxford

Telecoms and broadband giant BT Group (EE, Plusnet, Openreach etc.) has confirmed to ISPreview that, as part of their ongoing programme to modernise and consolidate the number of offices they have across the United Kingdom, they’ve decided to close their Contact Centres in Accrington, Blackburn and Doxford.

The BT Group currently employs just under 700 people across Blackburn and Accrington and just over 460 people in Doxford. Most colleagues are proposed to move to other nearby locations. For example, in Doxford, the current proposed closing date is said to be 31st October 2026 and staff have been offered the option to relocate to sites in Darlington and Newcastle.

The same October 2026 date has also been given for the other two contact centres, albeit with different relocation options. As usual some of those relocation options will not be viable for everybody, due to the usual issues of distance, practicality or cost etc. Discretionary Enhanced Redundancy (EVS) is being offered for those who live beyond reasonable travel to an alternative location.

A BT Group spokesperson said:

“As part of BT’s ongoing strategy to optimise our office estate and unlock value as part of our modernisation programme, we are proposing to close our Blackburn office on Jubilee Street as well as our Accrington and Doxford contact centres. This change will allow BT to continue to reinvest in spaces that better support our future ways of working and will provide our colleagues with a significantly improved work environment.”

BT said they’re working closely with impacted workers and indicate that most should be able to move to the “nearby” locations, although it remains to be seen how many will find that viable. BT has pledged to continue supporting all their colleagues at the Blackburn, Doxford and Accrington sites throughout these changes. Credits to one of our readers (Ed) for spotting the change.

In case anybody has forgotten, one of BT’s future strategic targets for 2030 has been to slash their total labour force to between 75,000 and 90,000. As of 31st March 2025, the Group had a total of 85,300 employees (mostly in the UK), representing a decrease of 6,400 (-6.98%) compared with the previous year. It’s worth pointing out that Openreach’s engineering teams will eventually also start to shrink once their FTTP build starts ramping down (likely to begin a few short years prior to rollout completion).