Television broadcasters are guilty of a systemic failure in the way they operate their premium-rate phone services, the industry’s watchdog says.

An Ofcom inquiry instigated after a series of call-in scandals found that the companies were in “denial” about their responsibilities to their viewers.

A £100 million industry in premium-rate phone-in votes and quizzes had created a culture of greed and the millions raised had “proved a gold-mine and it produced a gold rush”.

Ofcom said that broadcasters must develop a fairer and more competitive system for “participation TV”. A licence to broadcast should now include consumer protection obligations and phone-in votes must be subject to independent audits.

Ofcom asked Richard Ayre, a former senior BBC news executive, to conduct the inquiry after a series of scandals engulfing programmes.

Mr Ayre said: “Phoning a TV show isn’t like ordering pizza. When you put the phone down, nothing arrives. You just have to trust that your call was counted. If broadcasters want audiences to go on spending millions calling in, they need to show they take consumer protection as seriously as programme content.”

He found that “compliance failures were systemic” and that “revenue generation was a major driver in the growth of premium-rate services”.

“When votes went astray or winners could not be found in time the producers too often interpreted the audience interest as being a requirement to make it appear to viewers as though everything was working normally.”

He said that “intense pressure” was “applied by broadcasters upon producers, and by both upon service providers, to maximise revenues – and that meant maximising calls”.

Mr Ayre also examined complaints over obscure answers given to phone-in quiz questions. He concluded that the “methodology used to produce answers should be adequately explained” on air. There must also be clearer guidance on-screen to the exact cost of calls from mobile phones.

Ofcom said that it was minded to accept most of the recommendations. Ed Richards, the chief executive, said: “Ofcom takes these issues extremely seriously and will continue to take action against broadcasters found to break the rules in this area.”

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