Orange UK has confirmed that a "small number" of its customers have been unable to use their mobile phones over the last couple of days because of a technical fault. The victims appear to be punters upgrading their phones or switching between contract and pay as you go (PAYG) services.

Orange told us: "We can confirm that on Tuesday 8 June a small number of Orange customers upgrading their phones or moving from contract to PAYG may have experienced difficulties. This was due to a technical fault that has now been identified and resolved. Normal service has now been restored to all customers."

Well, not quite. El Reg has been contacted by one hacked-off Orange punter to say that his service is still down. What's more, he's been told by Orange support staff on more than one occasion that this technical fault has affected "thousands" of Orange punters.

A spokeswoman for the mobilephoneco promised to go away and investigate further.

Half an hour later she came and confirmed, rather sheepishly, that the problem has not been resolved.

Although the glitch has been identfied, Orange is still "working to resolve the issue so that normal service can be resumed to all customers as soon as possible", she told us belatedly. Ahem ®

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