HOAX calls to the fire service have dropped by half in the last five years, new figures reveal.

Figures just released by Essex County Fire and Rescue Service show a decline in the number of hoax calls the service receives dropping from 1599 in 2003 to 835 in 2008, a fall of 48 per cent.

Assistant divisional officer Vernon Kendall said: “Hoax calls are an unnecessary drain on the community’s resources, as a service we still deal with more than three a day.

“We recognise that the menace of hoax calls affects all people living within Essex and we are doing all we can to deter the hoax caller.”

Hoax calls to the service are monitored on a daily basis and when computers identify multiple hoax call offenders, the phones are disconnected.

Records show there were 1,599 hoax calls in 2003; 1,489 in 2004; 1,283 in 2005; 1,149 in 2006; 951 in 2007; and 835 in 2008.