THE UK COMMUNICATIONS REGULATOR OFCOM has received almost 1,000 complaints over Cheryl Cole’s refusal to cast her vote as a judge on X-Factor on Sunday evening.

Cole refused to choose between two of her acts, Treyc Cohen and Katie Waissel.

Two of the other three judges opted for Waissel, forcing Cohen off the show.

If Cole had voted for Waissel to leave, then the judges would have been tied and the contestant with the lowest public votes – Waissel -would have left the show.

The Guardian reports that 903 people have complained about Cole’s actions to the regulator.

Presenter Dermot O’Leary said they thought Cole might refuse to vote when they went to a commercial break before the voting, but says in the following video that “we never know which way the judges are going to vote”.

He said the show’s bosses had decided that if she pulled her vote, they would go to a majority verdict from the other judges:

Cole’s fellow judge Dannii Minogue said she would have behaved the same way if two of her acts had been put forward for the vote, the Sun reports.

An audience of about 17m people in the UK watched the show on Sunday night.