Holidaymakers are furious after waiting up to three weeks to get through to a telephone hotline to book trips abroad.

People have found that the Eurotunnel's hotline is not so hot after continually getting through to a recorded message.

The number to the company's call centre has been advertised as being staffed by a team of multi-lingual operators but passengers say they never answer.

One potential passenger, Brian Walsh, 38, of Hove, wanted to arrange a week-long trip to France with his wife and two children.

He has called the hotline number 08705 353535 every day for the last two-and-a-half weeks without success.

He has even sent the company faxes to try to arrange his trip to Le Touquet, in July, 2001, but has now given up and will take a ferry instead.

Mr Walsh said: "I cannot believe it. These people have no customer relations whatsoever.

"Call me old fashioned but I like to be able to talk to someone before I give them hundreds of pounds of my money.

"It is surprising Eurotunnel treat their customers with such contempt. You would have thought they would have made a bit more of an effort to get my money.

"They have not even responded to my faxes. All they tell you when you call up is they say they are very busy and you are advised to go to the website.

"But not everyone has access to the Internet. As they refuse to speak to me, I will take a ferry.

"P&O and Hoverspeed at least have friendly, helpful reservation staff you can phone."

Eurotunnel's shuttle services started in 1994 and the tunnel is linked to motorway networks in the UK and France, including the London-bound M20, the A16 in France taking traffic to Belgium and south to Paris, and Normandy.

A total of 360 shuttles and trains pass through the tunnel every day.

A spokeswoman for Eurotunnel said: "We have been very busy over the past week at our call centre and we are encouraging people not to call us at peak times.

"By far the best way of doing it is to use our website. If Mr Walsh still has trouble we will do our best to help."