Staff at a Lichfield shop are being told their jobs have gone after Phones 4U went into administration.

The company confirmed 5,596 jobs across the country would go as it closes all stores in the UK – including one in the Three Spires Shopping Centre.

The decision was blamed on a decision by mobile phone networks not to renew an agreement to sell their contracts and handsets in Phones 4U stores.

Phones 4U chief David Kassler explained: “If mobile network operators decline to supply us, we do not have a business.”

Councillor Philip Atkins, leader of Staffordshire County Council said the news had come as a shock.

“The announcement that Phones 4u is being placed in administration will be devastating news for its employees, as it appears to have come completely without warning,” he said. “Although we await the administrator’s decision on the company’s future, here in Staffordshire we are in a good position in terms of job creation and training and as a county we will be all pulling together to support staff based at the company’s Newcastle-under-Lyme headquarters and shops across our area who suddenly find themselves facing an uncertain future today.”

Founder of Lichfield Live and editor of the site.