NUISANCE calls from people telling you you've had an accident or you could recoup thousands of pounds from mis-sold PPI are the bain of most of our lives.

But that could be coming to an end for people in Somerset following BT's launch of a crackdown via a free service.

The phone giant is declaring war on companies that regularly pester its customers with nuisance calls.

It reckons its BT Call Protect Service could dump up to 30 million unwanted calls a week into a junk voicemail box, preventing them from irritating customers.

The latest research shows that on average people in the South West receive more than four nuisance calls every week, with 60 per cent of them saying they find it stressful and more than on in four concerned in case elderly relatives get conned.

BT Call Protect will combine network intelligence with the ability for customers to control the calls they receive, either from the home phone or online.

Network experts at the firm's centre in Oswestry can identify rogue numbers and add them to a BT blacklist.

Although the blacklist will divert the top offending nuisance callers, for calls not captured by the technology customers will be able compile their own personal blacklist by adding individual unwanted numbers by dialling 1572 after receiving the call or by going online.

They can also set BT Call Protect to divert whole categories of calls, such as international calls or those from withheld numbers.

Jon Reynolds, chairman of BT’s South West regional board, said: “This new service is great news for people in the South West.

"We know that nuisance calls are a big problem for people in our region, who receive many millions of such calls every year.

"Some of these calls can be upsetting and unnerving as well as very annoying, particularly for people who are more vulnerable perhaps through age or disability.

"We take this issue very seriously and, as this important new service demonstrates, are determined to do everything we can to help our customers beat the problem.”

BT has signed up television and radio presenter Christine Lampard as its ambassador to promote BT Call Protect to customers.

She said: “All of us have experienced the frustrations of nuisance calls at home, be it interruptions at family meal times, while you’re busy working or just trying to have a quiet evening in.

“My own parents have noticed a huge rise in these sorts of calls recently, an increase that seems to be affecting a majority of the older generation.

"BT Call Protect is a great new service designed to help prevent these calls.

"Any help we can give to our parents and grandparents to avoid the stress of nuisance calls gets my vote.”

John Petter, chief executive of BT Consumer, said: “We’re declaring war on the companies that regularly pester our customers with nuisance calls on subjects such as PPI and personal accident claims.

"We’re giving our customers the means to fight back against the millions of unwanted calls for free.

“We’ve been at the forefront of equipping our customers to defend themselves against the huge numbers of PPI and unwanted marketing calls that are continuing to grow.

"Now, with our unique technology, we can identify and tackle huge numbers of those calls in the network and also give our customers control over the calls they receive.

“We’re leading the way and calling on other telecoms companies to up their game in the fight against this menace.”

BT has previously led the fight to protect its customers from child abuse images on the internet with the development of the Cleanfeed filter.

And the company has helped prevent nuisance calls by developing the BT8500 Advanced Call Blocker phone which blocks up to 100 per cent of unwanted calls.

It is simple for customers to sign up to BT Call Protect. All they have to do is click here or call 0800-3891572.

FIVE WORST NUISANCE CALLERS IN THE UK in JUST ONE WEEK (December 13 to 19, 2016).

1. Accident claims, 12,288,022 (39 per cent).

2. PPI, 2,903,946 (9 per cent).

3. Computer scam, 2,673,665 (9 per cent).

4. Personal data request (scam), 1,434,890 (5 per cent).

5. Silent calls, 987,989 (3 per cent).

Other, 10,917,635 (35 per cent).

Total 31,206,396.