Land line out

[abunaitoo]

My land line phone has been out for over four weeks now.:-x
Phone company guy came and said the main line on the pole was all corroded.
Nothing he could do.
He made a report. Said it would be about a week before they would come out.
A few days later saw three trucks working up on the poles.
They were working on it for the rest of the week.
Still no phone.:-x
Next week saw them working on another pole.
Worked all week and still no phone.:-x
Last week I saw then pulling a new line.
Wondered why they didn't do that the first time.
It wasn't the problem. I still don't have a phone.:groner:
Found out it's the whole area that is out.
Now they are telling me maybe next week.[smilie=b:
At least the computer DSL is still working.:D
One good thing is no political robo calls. :D

[phonejack]

I'm retired phone company. Download a complaint form from your Public Service Commission, fill it out and send it in. They will contact the phone company. In my state when the phone company applies for a rate increase each and every PSC complaint is addressed. It can effect whether or not they get the increase. These complaints also are put into the specific supervisors file and it can effect his/her yearly evaluation .

[Ickisrulz]

If you have a good internet connection, get Magic Jack and be done with the phone company. Magic Jack is cheap.

[dragon813gt]

If you have a good internet connection, get Magic Jack and be done with the phone company. Magic Jack is cheap.

I agree w/ a VOIP service. I ditched the land line when I dropped DSL and switched to cable for my internet connection. Windstream wanted $70 a month for a land line. That’s ridiculous so I had the number ported over to 1-VOIP. Phone works like nothing changed.

[condorjohn]

+1 on the Magic Jack! I've had one for three years with only a few issues that were corrected in a timely manor. Very cost effective.

[wgr]

+1 on the Magic Jack! I've had one for three years with only a few issues that were corrected in a timely manor. Very cost effective.

what is magic jack

[Outpost75]

A concern with dependence on VOIP is whether E-911 positioning is active in your area because FCC requirements in some areas are not being met:

https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/voip-and-911-service

If you have or are thinking of subscribing to an interconnected VoIP service, you should:

Provide your accurate physical address to your interconnected VoIP service provider to ensure that emergency services can quickly be dispatched to your location.

Be familiar with your VoIP service provider's procedures for updating your address, and promptly update address information in the event of a change.

Have a clear understanding of any limitations of your 911 service.

Inform children, babysitters and visitors about your VoIP service and its 911 limitations, if any.

If your power is out or your Internet connection is down, be aware that your VoIP service may not work. Consider installing a backup power supply, maintaining a traditional phone line or having a wireless phone as a backup.

If you have questions about whether the phone service you are receiving is an interconnected VoIP service, contact your service provider for further information.

PSAPs currently lack the technical capability to receive texts, photos and video.

The FCC requires that providers of interconnected VoIP telephone services using the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) meet Enhanced 911 (E911) obligations. E911 systems automatically provide to emergency service personnel a 911 caller's call back number and, in most cases, location information.

To reduce possible risks to public safety, the FCC requires interconnected VoIP providers to:

Automatically provide 911 service to all customers as a standard, mandatory feature. VoIP providers may not allow customers to "opt-out" of 911 service.

Obtain a customer's physical location prior to service activation, and provide one or more easy ways for customers to update the location they have registered with the provider if it changes.

Transmit all 911 calls, as well as a callback number and the caller's registered physical location, to the appropriate emergency services call center or local emergency authority.

Take appropriate action to ensure customers have a clear understanding of the limitations, if any, of their 911 service. They must distribute labels warning customers if 911 service may be limited or not available and instruct them to place the labels on or near equipment used with VoIP service.

Obtain affirmative acknowledgement from all customers that they are aware of and understand the limitations of their 911 service.

Ensure that a 911 call is routed to the appropriate PSAP in areas where emergency service providers are not capable of receiving or processing the location information or call back numbers not automatically transmitted with 911 calls.

VoIP service providers that do not fully interconnect with the PSTN are not currently required to comply with the FCC's 911 and E911 rules.

[454 shooter]

The main phone line down here was cut by the county road crew a while back. I talked to the supervisor and he said he called it in right away. I called the phone company also and they said that they didn't know anything about it. I told them that both ends of the main wire were sticking out of the ground, everything was color coded and that I would hook some up until mine worked. They cautioned to be careful and the repairman was there in about an hour.

[anothernewb]

I ditched my land line after working with E911 phase 2. Cell detection is pretty dang good.

For those with VOIP be aware, that not all regional systems have incorporated the necessary changes to properly locate VOIP calls for 911. I am part of the group working on the MN next gen 911. Perhaps the east and west coast is ahead - but here in MN holy you know what is there a lot of work to do, and even the metro area is a ways behind for making things work.

Not that I'm trying to be a detractor, or trying to scare people in any way. internet systems are the way things are going. Just trying to give out some information.

[lightman]

I'm retired electric company. A Public Service Commission complaint does get attention. Most utility companies also have a standard about how long it takes to clear trouble. Good Luck on this.

I've worked on many major storms on coastal areas and corrosion from the salt air is an on going problem.

[Down South]

I ditched our land line about 10 yrs ago and don't miss it. We were hardly ever home anyway so to me it was money wasted.
We live out in the sticks so DSL was out of the question so is cable.

My internet is through Nexus Systems. It is a fixed wireless system. I receive and transmit a signal to a tower I can see from my home. I pay about $70 a month for unlimited service.

[abunaitoo]

I submitted a couple more service request.
Got a reply today telling me duplicates request will be deleted.
The line was suppose to be fixed yesterday.
Now they don't know when it's going to be done.
[smilie=b:

[Bird]

I have used Magic Jack for 10 years.. no problems. Also use Tracfone as backup. You can get magic jack free apps for the cellphone and ipad, but you need to be in range of your computer/ magic jack.

[NyFirefighter357]

what is magic jack

Magic jack plugs into your computer w/internet and you plug a phone into it. I works as VOIP. It costs about $35 to buy with first years service and $12 a year after that. I bought one for my mother. I think you could plug a cordless phone base into it as well. It can also be brought with you if you live seasonally or long visits to friend & family and have a computer with internet to plug it where you go. You can usually use your existing phone number as well. I had my mother take her NY phone number on it and she uses it in FL. I was paying $40+ a month to have her landline (second #) for her to check her messages.

http://www.magicjack.com/index.html

[Handloader109]

My rural power company just finished installing fiber cable to us this past week. Gigabit service for the same as I was paying dish for satellite service that was limited to 25mbits and 50 gigabytes per month. I'm hitting 350 to 400 which is great. So I reinstalled ooma system I had bought about 5 yrs ago before moving here. Great service , costs only the taxes you pay on phone systems. About $5 a month and you can set up 911 location ....

[Down South]

My rural power company just finished installing fiber cable to us this past week. Gigabit service for the same as I was paying dish for satellite service that was limited to 25mbits and 50 gigabytes per month. I'm hitting 350 to 400 which is great. So I reinstalled ooma system I had bought about 5 yrs ago before moving here. Great service , costs only the taxes you pay on phone systems. About $5 a month and you can set up 911 location ....

I'm envious.

[Lloyd Smale]

Next week saw them working on another pole.
Worked all week and still no phone.
Last week I saw then pulling a new line.
Wondered why they didn't do that the first time. utility companys have had to cut back on personal and repair money. When I started as an electrical lineman in the early 80s we had 10 lineman in our office, two bosses and two secretarys. today they have 5 lineman one how is the working boss and that's it. We had about an unlimited budget to repair old stuff and did routine rebuilds on older lines every year. Today they don't rebuild something till it falls down and repairs are done as cheaply as possible. Im sure they first had to attempt to fix your line and found it was beyond repair and had to replace it. If they would have come there and replaced a line that could have been fairly easy to get up and running with a few bandaids. how would you think rate payers 10 miles away that phone bill is relative to maintance costs would have reacted to them spending there phone bill money on something that didn't need replacing. This is the type of thing you have to except if you want reasonable utility bills. When I first worked we never had ANYONE out of power for more then 24 hours. If we thought it was a possibility we called in help from other districts and even other utility companys. Todays reality is cost cutting has made that impossible and 2 and 3 day outages are getting common. people that don't work in these fields tend to think with a narrow forcus. they think these workers are at the shop sitting around and laughing while there phone or power is out. the forget that there are thousands of other customers that 2 or 3 guys have to keep up and running. Ask yourself this. Would you approve a rate hike in your phone bill if you had the option to vote to insure this never happened again or are you going to look at it logicaly and say it never happened before and it probably wont ever happen again so am I going to vote to increase my bill in case someone else has this happen to them?

[Handloader109]

I'm envious.

Three LONG Years with Satellite junk was really HARD. We all had to bounce between cell data and satellite as we would hit the limit about a third of the time. And the satellite would barely then do email.
Streaming? Yeah, I could stream, with a paper streamer running thru the yard..... It was hilarious to see Dish offer streaming for free on the TV service. The only issue is that it went THROUGH and counted against the data limit.
What a hoax. I couldn't even stream a Youtube video at decent quality. Now it blasts through on 3 tvs and a couple of computers at the same time. Yeah, sweet.

[mold maker]

I use cable service for TV, internet, and LL phone. Of the three, the phone has had the least problems. Even when the power was out over most of the city after Hugo, the phones worked.

[abunaitoo]

They were working on the line again today.
They replaced another main line.
Phone worked for about three hours, and shorted out again.
When it was working, lots of static.
So bad, not really usable.
I guess they'll have to try again.
I was thinking of changing to cable phone, but rectum cable bought out the cable service.
Don't want to give them anymore.
We have fiber phone, but it cost almost double.
Computer works fine.

[abunaitoo]

Phone is still out.
Guy came today and said another main line needs to be changed.
He said he saw a crew was changing a line down the street.
He checked the line on the pole just to be sure.
Nothing more he could do.
He put in another service ticket.
He suggested a change to fiber.
At least the computer is still working.
Slower than before, but still working.

[uscra112]

Question, as long as we're talking about Magic Jack.

I have AT&T landline. Living where I do there is no cell signal at all, and no possibility of Internet except satellite. The landline has gone out three times in the last 3-4 years, once for four solid weeks. At my age and state of health I don't like being without any phone at all. My only communication with the outside world is email, if the phone ain't working. Or I can drive 10 minutes up the road to get cell signal. Something that might be impossible if I were in need of EMT services.

Now, my Hughes link is now fast enough to handle VOIP, but the latency is such that I would not like to have VOIP over it as my only phone.

Soooo - if I install Magic Jack for emergencies only, can I share the AT&T number with it, or would I have to have a separate number?

[Rick N Bama]

It's sad that Phone Companies customer service has gone downhill so much. When I worked as a service tech for Bellsouth if a report came in by 3:00 it was dispatched on that day and if at all possible repairs were made that day. It would be rare that a trouble report would be carried over until the next day.

[Bird]

Question, as long as we're talking about Magic Jack.

I have AT&T landline. Living where I do there is no cell signal at all, and no possibility of Internet except satellite. The landline has gone out three times in the last 3-4 years, once for four solid weeks. At my age and state of health I don't like being without any phone at all. My only communication with the outside world is email, if the phone ain't working. Or I can drive 10 minutes up the road to get cell signal. Something that might be impossible if I were in need of EMT services.

Now, my Hughes link is now fast enough to handle VOIP, but the latency is such that I would not like to have VOIP over it as my only phone.

Soooo - if I install Magic Jack for emergencies only, can I share the AT&T number with it, or would I have to have a separate number?
http://wp.magicjack.com/features/types-internet-service-compatible-magicjack/

Appears it will not work well with Hughes.

[Boaz]

Magic Jack ……...Good deal ! Haven't paid a penny for home phone in 8-10 years and works as long as internet is up .

[MT Gianni]

utility companys have had to cut back on personal and repair money. When I started as an electrical lineman in the early 80s we had 10 lineman in our office, two bosses and two secretarys. today they have 5 lineman one how is the working boss and that's it. We had about an unlimited budget to repair old stuff and did routine rebuilds on older lines every year. Today they don't rebuild something till it falls down and repairs are done as cheaply as possible. Im sure they first had to attempt to fix your line and found it was beyond repair and had to replace it. If they would have come there and replaced a line that could have been fairly easy to get up and running with a few bandaids. how would you think rate payers 10 miles away that phone bill is relative to maintance costs would have reacted to them spending there phone bill money on something that didn't need replacing. This is the type of thing you have to except if you want reasonable utility bills. When I first worked we never had ANYONE out of power for more then 24 hours. If we thought it was a possibility we called in help from other districts and even other utility companys. Todays reality is cost cutting has made that impossible and 2 and 3 day outages are getting common. people that don't work in these fields tend to think with a narrow forcus. they think these workers are at the shop sitting around and laughing while there phone or power is out. the forget that there are thousands of other customers that 2 or 3 guys have to keep up and running. Ask yourself this. Would you approve a rate hike in your phone bill if you had the option to vote to insure this never happened again or are you going to look at it logicaly and say it never happened before and it probably wont ever happen again so am I going to vote to increase my bill in case someone else has this happen to them?

While that is true a report of a month long outage to the PSC would result in a hire order in most States. The monopoly was given to the Utility with the expectation of prompt service. Failure to maintain such can and should result in the loss of a franchise though this might take 10 years.
The problem is so few people are using landlines the employees are running to maintain service. Where they had 100,000 customers many now have 20,000. At some point it may be as necessary as coal deliveries and just be dropped altogether.

[Rick N Bama]

While that is true a report of a month long outage to the PSC would result in a hire order in most States. The monopoly was given to the Utility with the expectation of prompt service. Failure to maintain such can and should result in the loss of a franchise though this might take 10 years.
The problem is so few people are using landlines the employees are running to maintain service. Where they had 100,000 customers many now have 20,000. At some point it may be as necessary as coal deliveries and just be dropped altogether.

AT&T has, or at least had, a goal of being copper free by the end of 2020. Whether or not it'll happen is anyone's guess. In my part of the world it's easy to see that they no longer care about maintaining the copper plant. Almost every day I pass by where a Pedestal was damaged by the County Bush Hogging two weeks ago and nothing has been done to repair it. I doubt if it ever will be repaired.

[Down South]

Land lines are going the way of the dinosaur, they are going into extinction. I cut my land line about 10 yrs ago.

[David2011]

We have very long conversations with family and friends several times a week. I would not want to do that with a cell phone just for discomfort reasons. Not a speakerphone fan either but we use it for family calls.

[Rick N Bama]

As a phone co retiree my monthly bill is under $10.00, I'll keep my landline as long as I can!

[MrWolf]

I had dropped my landline before moving here. With lousy cell coverage even after putting up a 43' tower I have the landline for safety reasons.

[Handloader109]

Hughesnet, dishnet wont work. If you turn on or use google, don't you notice you never have same location two days in a row? Satelitte internet has no ability for fixed ip address, and is just ****.

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk

[uscra112]

Hughesnet, dishnet wont work. If you turn on or use google, don't you notice you never have same location two days in a row? Satelitte internet has no ability for fixed ip address, and is just ****.

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk

Haven't done a rigorous observation, but as far as I can see my IP addy doesn't change day to day. Will keep a close watch for a few days and report back.

BTW I avoid Guugle, and you should, too.

[abunaitoo]

After close to seven weeks, Our phone is working............for now.
Guy came today.
I told him what was done so far.
Told him the first guy said there's a short on the main line.
He checked and said there was a short on the main line.
He went up the pole and checked.
He jumped something and the phones work.
He had to call in to have them change something for the internet.
Now everything is working.....BUT.
He said they have to do something to repair something.
Another crew needs to come out.
So...he said it's working now, and he thinks it should be OK, until they do the repairs.
Well at least it's working now[smilie=l:

[uscra112]

Hughesnet, dishnet wont work. If you turn on or use google, don't you notice you never have same location two days in a row? Satelitte internet has no ability for fixed ip address, and is just ****.

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk

Been ten days. My IP address according to https://whatismyipaddress.com/ hasn't changed at all.

[Handloader109]

Check location, are you where it says you live? Even in the same state? Both of my desktops, and tablets never kept same location for more than a couple of days. In over 3 years, every time I logged into a secure bank, retirement or payment system, it would ask for extra login steps as it could Never identify any computer as being the same as last time.

New system is no issue at all. I wish no one had to use satellite internet.

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk

[uscra112]

Can't corroborate what you claim. My geolocation never changes, either. Always a spot in Kansas.

Nothing wrong with Hughes, unless you expect it to be something it's not. I'm not a gamer, never stream movies, never would even think of doing online banking or bill-payments. It works fine for me, although losing signal during heavy rainfall or snowfall is a bit of a bother when it happens.

My original question still stands: Do I need a dedicated phone number from AT&T to use VOIP? Or could I use the one I have, and simply plug it into the VOIP modem when I need it for backup? Getting a second physical landline here would involve burying another wire from the roadside junction box to the house, I assume. Several hundred yards. Could be spendy.

[abunaitoo]

Finally done this past week.
Longest it ever been a problem.
Our phone company is not owned by a local anymore.
Hasn't been for a while.
Most of the workers are good, hard working, but from talking to them, right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing.
I'm just glad it's fixed.

[uscra112]

When mine was out for two weeks, AT&T at least had the decency to credit my account for the downtime. Hope they'll do that for you.

[abunaitoo]

Spoke to soon.
Static on the phone line started up again.
Phone guy's worked on it. Changed more lines.
Helped, but still static on the line from tome to time.
They kept on suggesting I change to fiber optic.
When I call about it, they said it would cost more.
The last repair guy that came said it shouldn't cost anything more.
He called and found out that it wouldn't cost anymore.
Seems they just wanted to up grade me to get more money.
Told him if he could get them to put it in writing, I would change to fiber.
Got the letter and started the process to change to fiber.
They got it done last week.
It didn't help any with the internet that I could see.
I did do a speed test, and it shows it is faster. But I don't notice any difference.
What I do notice, is no more static on the phone.
We'll have to keep a close watch on the bill to be sure the rates don't go up.
Repair guy said if it does, I can cancel the fiber, and go back to copper line.
Hope they didn't lie to me in writing.

[Lloyd Smale]

land lines aren't going the way of the dinasours as long as people get internet service off of them. As a matter of fact phone companys are investing millions to upgrade them to fiber optic. Id give up my cell phone in heartbeat before id give up my land line and rely entirely on a cell phone. but then I use my phone to actually call real people and TALK. Not as a video entertainment and internet surfing device. No call is that important to me that im going to pack a cell phone with me every day all day. If you want to talk to me call my land line. If im not home I have an answering machine. I MIGHT even call you back. I do have an old flip phone for when I go to camp where there is no land line but its never turned on unless I WANT to call someone.

[Rick N Bama]

land lines aren't going the way of the dinasours as long as people get internet service off of them. As a matter of fact phone companys are investing millions to upgrade them to fiber optic. Id give up my cell phone in heartbeat before id give up my land line and rely entirely on a cell phone. but then I use my phone to actually call real people and TALK. Not as a video entertainment and internet surfing device. No call is that important to me that im going to pack a cell phone with me every day all day. If you want to talk to me call my land line. If im not home I have an answering machine. I MIGHT even call you back. I do have an old flip phone for when I go to camp where there is no land line but its never turned on unless I WANT to call someone.

You're right that Landlines aren't going away, but if you're in an area served by AT&T, Copper Plant is going away. They're doing very little to maintain their plant now. I spent 31 years working for South Central Bell which became Bellsouth which was bought out by AT&T. I see plant every time I go out that would have gotten supervisors fired if it had not been corrected within a day or so. Employees drive by one such disaster every day with no action being taken to correct the problem.

[Lloyd Smale]

rick i don't doubt it a bit. I was an electrical lineman for 30 years. You think the phone system in this country is in bad shape you should look at your power grid. How many times has your phone not worked in the last 5 years? How many times did you have a power outage? When i first started we were allways doing rebuilds and upgrades. Around 1995 that all ended. Rate increases were tougher to get and the money just wasn't there to do that kind of work so we spend our time band aiding worn out junk. Funny thing is everyone wants to complain about reliability and modern upgrades but no one wants to pay to get them. I don't care if its the phone company, power company, your local road commission patching roads or the state putting band aids on there bridges ect. It all costs money. Improvements and new technology costs money. Money that doesn't grow on trees out back of your phone companys building. Why would you think you should get improvements for free? I have a flip phone. If i want better technology, texting internet, smart phone technology ect i have to go and buy a new phone. Verison doesn't hand them out for free. If the government stepped in and told verison they are now capped on what they can charge for new technology or tell them the most they can charge for a cell phone is a 100 bucks youd still be using flip phones. Bottom line is att&t has stock holders. They have to show a profit or there stock tanks and there business dies. What hurts them more then anything is cell phones. take a 1/4 of fords customers and have them go to chev and see how much money ford can afford to put into research and development and new technology. Wait, someday someone will come up with some new way of communication that is better then cell phones. See then how well cell phone towers are maintained and upgraded. That is unless your willing to pay twice as much to keep them going. It isn't att&ts fault. They have a budget that is based on profits. They cant plow all new fiber optic line into your town without making everyone in the neighboring town pay for it too. Not when only a few branches of that money tree still put out fruit. So they do there best at keeping whats already there plugging along.

[abunaitoo]

The ceo of the power company here makes almost $2m a year.
I'm sure the rest of the top makes close to $1m a year Probably more..
If they would be paid a reasonable wage, they would have the funds for upgrades and repairs.
Monopoly here. Only one power station, and one land line phone company for each island.
Phone company here is worried.
Most people have dumped land line.
Computer is cable or wireless.

[mold maker]

Before cell phones and dial phones we had a party line and 3 digit phone number. It worked. You told the operator the number you wanted or sometimes the name and she connected you, period. I don't ever remember it failing unless there was physical damage from a storm.
I still live in the same home, served by the same wire from the pole to house. It still worked when I canceled service because the price had become outrageous.
The new technology phone, cable, and WiFi connection, only cost a little more than the phone line at that time, but every time there is a storm, it all fails. TV programming is cruddy and even local news is politically biased.
BTW the bill has more than doubled.
I guess it's better than smoke signals, but building the fire is the difference.

[Lloyd Smale]

yup and ceo's of most major companys make those kinds of wages. Why should a power company be a bit different. Id have to guess the ceo of verison makes even more the that. I doubt they would get any good experienced ceo for 50k a year. One thing to keep in mind is the land line phone companys and internet and tv providers keep the dish companys and cell phone providers in check with pricing. If they all went away and everyone had only one choice then id about bet my home that prices would soar. We have only one choice for a land line here too. Its a small local company that hasn't been bought up YET. Might be lower prices if att&t bought them but im sure service would suffer from it. That said our local power company has been bought out twice since I retired. Both companys were bigger and had a better bottom line. Our power bills sure haven't gone down and the lineman working there tell nothing but horror stories about cut backs, service, and upgrading lines. Like it or not there all businesses that the real goal is to make money for stock holders and not making your life easier or cheaper. Ill stick with my little local land line company thank you. At least if I do have problems im dealing with someone I know not an answering service in india!
The ceo of the power company here makes almost $2m a year.
I'm sure the rest of the top makes close to $1m a year Probably more..
If they would be paid a reasonable wage, they would have the funds for upgrades and repairs.
Monopoly here. Only one power station, and one land line phone company for each island.
Phone company here is worried.
Most people have dumped land line.
Computer is cable or wireless.