BUS operators are set to be fined if they repeatedly change their timetables, county hall bosses have warned.

They will also be obliged to pay their share for the running of a call centre dedicated to telling people what time their bus is due.

Lancashire County Council has unveiled its Bus Information Strategy, which it hopes will ultimately lead to more people travelling by bus. At the heart of the plan is making bus travel reliable and convenient.

Now they are set to make use of powers given to them under the Transport Act 2000 to bring troublesome bus firms into line. Firms which change their timetables more than three times a year or change timetables without telling Lancashire County Council will be fined.

At the same time, firms which refuse to contribute to the running of the centralised phone timetable service will be pursued through the courts for their share of the costs.

A report to the transport overview and scrutiny committee revealed that more than 150,000 people were ringing the bus service call centre every year.

"It is proving to be a valuable service and it is important that the information we give is correct," a spokesman said.

The report stated: "The call centre provides valuable information every year and supports all public transport. Under the new strategy, we will be able to charge operators who are not contributing at the moment.

"The major operators are not the problem. Where operators frequently change services, which in the longer term is a destructive practice which leads to confusion among customers and extra work load for us, we propose that more than three service amendments per year would result in us charging the operator for doing so."

No details of cost have been revealed.

Ensuring that the information from the bus call centre is accurate is one of a number of way the county council is trying to get more people back on buses. People can also request bus timetables via text messaging, simply entering their bus stop number into their phone and then being told when the next bus will arrive.

Improvements are also being made to the presentation of bus timetables to make them easier to understand, with Braille versions being made available for blind people.

"The aim is to have every bus stop in Lancashire fitted with a timetable of services by 2006," the report said.