BT will close its Fort William contact centre resulting in forty redundancies.

The telecoms giant took the decision following a review to consolidate its activities into a smaller number of centres.

According to BT the Manpower-managed centre will close during the 2010/11 financial year.

A BT spokesperson told the BBC, "We will agree a closure date within the next few weeks and will communicate to the team in early May.

"Our priority now, with the assistance of Manpower, is to be able to clearly communicate to the team what our exit strategy is and to give them a timeframe for this to be completed.

"We will also be working closely with Manpower to help people find alternative work within the community."

BT said its contact centres in Alness and Thurso would remain open