If the amount of cabling Coventry's Active Communications has installed for Budget Insurance Services were laid down end to end it would stretch all the way to London.

The Eastern Green company has installed 85 miles of structured data cabling at Budget's offices in Coventry city centre and at its Peterborough headquarters.

The work is part of a total refurbishment of Budget's eight-floor offices in Corporation Street.

Another 15 miles of cabling will start to be laid at Budget's affinity contact centre in Sunderland as part of a long-term programme.

Coventry's Lord Mayor, Cllr Sucha Singh Bains, attended the grand opening along with Budget's Group Chief Executive, Peter Winslow, and officially opened the refurbished offices on Thursday 18th September 2003 to mark the completion of the scheme.

Pete Jacobs, a partner at Active Communications, said his firm had installed the original cabling at the Corporation Street office block in 1995 when it was occupied by Dial Direct, who were acquired by Budget in October, 2001.

"We installed the cabling here eight years ago and it is ironic we have returned," he said.

"There was a tender procedure which we won to replace the cabling in the whole building."

"We're continuing a long-term programme with them. We have completed the work in Coventry and go to Sunderland at the end of September to install the cabling there."

Harry Wright, Director of Technical Services and Property at Budget, which is one of the UK's leading personal lines insurance intermediaries, said about 400 people were employed at the contact centre in Coventry.

"We have used Active on numerous occasions on six of our sites from Hillingdon in London to Sunderland and they previously did work for us when we were Dial Direct," he said.

"They are excellent to work with and demonstrate a high level of professionalism."

Budget's Technical Services Senior Manager, Dave Brown, said: "It has taken six months to refurbish the building from top to bottom; every three weeks we completed a new floor but the result is well worth all the hard work."

PICTURE: (from left to right) Harry Wright, Budget's Director of Technical Services and Property, Pete Jacobs, Partner at Active Communications, Dave Brown, Budget's Technical Services Senior Manager