Several shops say they have been forced to shut early due to disruptive power cuts and maintenance work.

Businesses in Chatham town centre say troubles with their phone lines and card machines have affected them being able to trade.

UK Power Networks is carrying out maintenance work in the High Street after eight businesses reported experiencing problems with their power.

Yesterday, the Wisdom Hospice shop and Burton were forced to close due to the lack of power.

Lorraine Baisley, a team leader at Burton, said the disruption had been going on for three weeks.

She said: "We were shut all day yesterday. The electric was on and we opened for an hour, then the lights went off and we had to evacuate."

Staff at the shop then decided to close for the rest of the day.

Molly Johal, who volunteers at the Wisdom Hospice shop, said the power had been disruptive intermittently since Monday, February 10, and volunteers were told to go home yesterday.

She said: "There are people out there who look like they are digging up the road. We can't do anything; we can't use the card machine or telephone."

The disruption is thought to have affected at least three other shops in the High Street.

According to Medway Council's website – which authorises work to take place when highways are affected – UK Power Networks is currently carrying out essential repair to a low voltage mains cable.

The work is planned to go on until Wednesday, February 19.

UKPN spokesman Tracey Elsey said: "We would like to apologise for the power cuts which have affected eight businesses over recent months, in the High Street area of Chatham.

"Our engineers are digging in two locations to find an intermittent fault on an underground cable, and install new equipment which will also help pinpoint the problem.

"We appreciate how difficult it is to be without power and will get supplies back to normal as quickly as is safely possible.

"To be resilient during occasional power interruptions, we always encourage customers who rely on power for essential business or commercial reasons to arrange back-up supplies."

Earlier this week, the Pentagon Shopping Centre was shut off whilst staff dealt with flooding due to Storm Ciara.

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