UKC

Good morning,

Any thoughts before I arrange for a BT engineer to come out and risk spending £99.

For about a week now I've not been able to receive calls to my landline. However I can make calls and my internet connection has not be distrupted at all.

Phone is plugged into same filter as internet hub wire and then into BT wall socket.

I've bought new phones to no avail - problem is still there.

When the landline is rung it generally either cuts off the call on first ring or if I phone from the mobile it may try and ring once and then gives the number busy display.

I've had BT do a remote fault test this morning and they say the line is showing as fine and the fault must be within the house. So why can I get internet fine but not receive calls?

When I unplug everything and ring the number it just keeps ringing.

Any ideas before I get them to send around a engineer?

Frustrated of UKC,
Sam

In reply to La Shamster: If you can't receive calls - rejoice! Wish we couldn't!

In reply to Submit to Gravity:

Thanks for your help.

In reply to La Shamster:

Everything? How much have you got connected to the system? There is a limit.

Strip out everything that you can. Ideally you should have just a known-working phone plugged into the master socket. If this fails, it's probably BT's fault. Otherwise you'll be paying for an engineer to come and tell you that you've got too much and/or the wrong devices connected to the system.

The internet uses the line between your house and the local exchange at which point it's "unbundled" and the internet signal is sent on a different route. So working internet is only an indication that the line is good (good enough for internet), it doesn't tell you much about the telephone equipment connected to the end.

In reply to Hairy Pete:

Sorry guess the use of everything was confusing. I only have one base unit phone together with the additional phone that receives the wireless signal from the base unit in a different room.

Everything was working fine until a week ago when I first realised I wasn't receiving calls.

I've tried the base unit phone in every BT wall socket in the house and it's the same result.

Why can I make calls without problems but not receive?

In reply to La Shamster: how many phone sockets have you got? If youhave only got the bt master socket then everything up to that point is bt's problem.

I'd you have many sockets then un screwibg the front panel on the master socket and removing the lower half should disconnect everything else. You can then plug a known working phone in to the socket that the lower panel came out of.if it works then problem it's on your extensions, if out doesn't then it's a bt job.

This if what I recall from similar issues, there are some useful trouble shooting pages on the bt website which give some pictures of this process.

In reply to DaveN:

I have a master socket and then 3 others in 3 separate rooms. I have plugged the phone into the master socket and still have the problem.

In reply to La Shamster: http://bt.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/13568/~/fault-testing-with-a...

Near the bottom. Also swap out the plug in filer that separates out the phone and internet, just in case.

And ringer volumes on phone, had a house mate who kept turning it down at night, but never back on in the morning!

In reply to La Shamster: Could be a number of things, most likely the socket has a fault. It doesn't sound like you have anything plugged into any extension sockets... If you do, unplug those before the test.

Find the Master Socket (99% of the time it will be where the phone line first enters the house) and will be larger than any extension sockets. The newer ones have a clip-off plate on the front that you can plug a phone into - if yours doesn't, don't worry.

Disconnect any micro filters (small "box" your phone and ADSL cables plug into) and plug your phone *directly* into the master socket (behind the plate if it's a face-off model) and call it from your mobile just like your previous tests. If you have a spare phone, try that one in there too.

If the phones still don't ring, raise a fault with BT and arrange for an engineer to come out - you'll have done everything you could to eliminate your side and I'm sure you won't be charged.

In my personal experience, BTs remote tests miss more faults on their kit than they identify...

In reply to La Shamster:

Beg, borrow or steal a wired phone that you know works. Plug it, and only it, into the master socket. If it works try your base unit next, etc..


I'm with STG on this! However, there are other side effects that you might worry about. If the line is being held when you make out-going calls you could be racking up a huge bill, i.e. your two minute call plus however long it takes to clear the line.
Gezzz ask the technical questions won't you? You might have noticed, or not, that there are only two telephone wires that enter your house (I assume you're on the standard BT system - none of this fancy "cable" or such like). Aside from the speech signal (and internet) these two wires have to communicate the state of the phone, i.e. off-hook, or on hook, based on technology that was available about 100 years ago. When the receiver is down, only the bell circuit is connected, by an AC coupling, to the exchange. So the exchange can ring the bell. When you pick-up the receiver the exchange needs to know this so that it can turn-off the ringing circuit and connect the speech circuit. Your telephone indicates the off-hook state by allowing a DC current to flow. The off-hook state is how you normally dial-out, which explains why you can still make out-going calls.
It sounds as if something that you have connected, possibly your base unit, is leaking DC and therefore tricking the exchange into thinking that you've lifted the receiver. The voltages used to ring the bell are much higher than the normal, off-hook voltages, hence the first ring might be triggering the fault in whatever device you have connected.

In reply to La Shamster:

Have you tried the test socket, not the master socket? If a known working phone is plugged into that, no filters, then it is most likely a BT problem, but there can be other explanations depending on who installed the boxes.

In reply to La Shamster:

All the above advice is sound.

Just double check your number is right by making an outgoing call to your mobile and check that your number comes up.

Otherwise you could have what we call a rectified loop on your line which would cause what your describing.

J

In reply to La Shamster:

Thank you for all the above help. Just checked the most recent billing info for recent usage and that's all ok in keeping with what I would expect.
Weirdly the phone has started working again and the only thing I did was what someone posted about making sure the ring tone volume is switched up. I don't understand why this would make a difference but it seems to at the moment. Any ideas?

In reply to La Shamster: a lot of sound advice above but not all correct, firstly the bit about charges, if you report a fault and bts system does not recognise a fault and when the bt openreach engineer arrives he will carry out a pair quality test and if he dosent find anything wrong "YOU WILL BE CHARGED" regardless of the fact it hasnt been proved to your equipment. if the fault is intermittant this happens a lot.
from what you describe unless its the phone then its probably a ring trip fault caused by low insulation, this wont always show on the initial remote test and if its not on at the time may not show on the pair quality test either.
as said above if it reoccurs borrow a known working phone from a neighbour and plug it into main socket without anything else plugged in including adsl filters ( these are favourite for this type of fault. disconnect any extensions as well.
if it dosent do it then the problem will be a piece of kit or extension, a process of elimination should narrow it down, if it still does it with nothing connected then it the line or main socket and as long as its not dampness in the house you should be ok to report it.
another way is unplug absolutely everything and ring it from your mobile, if it cuts of after 1 or 2 rings then its a ring trip fault, reoprt it.
the ring tone volume probably hasnt anything to do with it just coincidence, fault has probably rectified enough to stop tripping the line, if its moisture related it will be back.

In reply to La Shamster: I only meant to check that the ringer (bell) volume was not turned down, allowing you to hear when it was ringing.

Go through the steps, bt also have them on their site. If it's working now keep an eye on it. We had a fault caused where previous owner had run a cable under a door, the dour had started to pinch the cable an cause a fault, so have a look for anything obvious-this should come out in the test you do using the master socket's test socket.