Issues with Telus Home Phone?

[bignerd]

We switched to Telus back in May, home phone, internet, cable.

When I go to dial out on the phone, about 50% of the time I will get silence, or a few rings, and then a recording that either my call could not be completed as dialed-please check the area code and number, OR if making a long distance call, to please dial "1" and then the number before making a long distance call. It will also tell me that 1-800 numbers are not in use when I know they are.

These are numbers I call all the time-they are in service and are correct, I always dial a "1" and then the area code before calling long distance. Sometimes I can hang up and try re-dialling three, four, five+ times in a row and get the same recordings.

I reported it to telus and they put me through to their tech department who gets on the line with you when you dial and of course when they are on the line the calls go through fine....

Anyone know what the issue is? We had no problems when it was Shaw.

[eblend]

Sounds very weird, since telus is just straight up oldschool telephone service, no internet involved (locally at least). Could it somehow be your actual phone?

[raceman6135]

Do you have the POTS or VOIP version of their home phone?

If it's POTS, unplug everything that is plugged into the telephone network: modem/routers, fax machines, answering machines, alarm systems, all telephone handsets, cordless phones, etc. Then plug one phone in and test the system. If it works fine for the day or two, it could be a faulty device causing the line problems, as eblend eluded to.

If it's VOIP, try rebooting your modem.

With any system, carefully check all wires for damage, loose connections, etc.

If nothing works, call TELUS' tech support each time you have problems and they will send a tech out.

If you're comfortable doing more tech support on your own, find the demarc box and open it up. There will be an RJ11 jack inside. If the phone works fine there, that means that the lines from your house to the TELUS system are fine and that the problem is somewhere inside your house.

[bignerd]

I would think it was something with the Telus equipment or lines as like I said, I never had problems with Shaw. Also not the telephone, I have the same phone as I had with Shaw and am now having the issues, also bought a new phone and still having issues.

I think I have VOIP, they came and installed one big silver modem downstairs and that is it. Only have the telephones, internet and cable/digital tv.

I will check the connections and reboot the modem, no I am not comfortable enough to take stuff apart and start looking for jacks and lines and what not.

Will see what I can figure out, thanks for the tips.

[eblend]

Originally posted by bignerd
I would think it was something with the Telus equipment or lines as like I said, I never had problems with Shaw. Also not the telephone, I have the same phone as I had with Shaw and am now having the issues, also bought a new phone and still having issues.

I think I have VOIP, they came and installed one big silver modem downstairs and that is it. Only have the telephones, internet and cable/digital tv.

I will check the connections and reboot the modem, no I am not comfortable enough to take stuff apart and start looking for jacks and lines and what not.

Will see what I can figure out, thanks for the tips.

The big silver modem thing is probably a DLINK home gateway (as they call it) which is just a modem and router + homePNA built into one. Disconnect it, if your phone still works then you are just on standard copper. There really isn't to many things that can go wrong with copper, its just 2 wires, if there is a clean connection they work. Do what was recommended raceman and open the demark box outside the house (usually) and plug a phone directly into the test jack, that will tell you if your line is good. I learned alot about the POTS system when I switch to telus like 2 month ago and had massive line quality problems, so I know that at the end of the day it is just a physical connection of 2 wires (more if you have multiple phone lines).

In your basement you should see a POTS splitter, probably white, with markings like "modem, phone, line on it, that is where the split happens of the actual line signal to block out the modem noises (if you had DSL long before then you will remember that there were DSL filters, those are no longer used as the POTS splitter takes care of that). POTS splitter will have a jack and a hardwired port, only one should be used at a time, so you should see that your "phone" portion feeds directly into your phone house wireing.

Another thing to note....could it possibly be that your phone for some reason is set to "pulse" dialing instead of "tone", I know those are dialing options that can cause problems if improperly set (should be tone)