Big Mystery...Phone won't ring

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Joyce
I had this same problem: new

I had this same problem: new cordless phone run through my cable modem (Comcast) will dial out but won't ring.

When I hook the phone right up to the modem, it rings! (total distance from cable modem to phone = ~5 feet)
When I hook the phone up in my office, it doesn't ring. (total distance from cable modem to phone = ~30-40 feet)

I checked the DC voltage levels (phone not ringing) using a multimeter, and it's 47.3V right off the cable modem and 47.0V in the office. No detectable difference when the line is being called. I doubt this 0.3V makes a big difference, but either way, my ringing is sensitive to voltage level.

My plan is to get an old non-cordless phone and plug it in so I can hear the ring, and use my cordless phone in my office.

Vinny218
Ok,finally after 2 years, I

Ok,finally after 2 years, I am up and running. My new Panasonic triple KX-TG523E is working. That is the ringer "rings" when you phone it. The technician from Virgin Media told me that the voltage for my new set was the same as the old one. What he did do was go to the street junction box and change/replace the wiring. This did the trick for me. maybe this will filter through and we can all get some joy.
Good luck to all of you.

sylvest
We had the same problem. None

We had the same problem. None of our phones would ring. We called our phone company and they fixed it the next day. It's nice to know it had nothing to do with us or our phones. It was the phone company who had to make the repair- no charge to us.

coral
hi people i have the same

hi people i have the same kind of problem,ive got a cordless bt digital clarity house phone and all of a sudden it has stopped ringing people,i dial the numbers and it doent make a noise untill 2 mins later all i can hear is the numbers dialing and thats it nothing rings..

AmyB
Having a similar problem...

Having a similar problem...

- Neither cordless nor corded phone will ring in the house. The caller hears them ringing but voicemail never picks up.

- BUT... I can make outgoing calls. And if I'm on the phone and a call comes in, call waiting beeps and I can pick up the call.

- I've already checked to make sure the ringers are on, and we haven't changed anything in the past couple of days, when this started happening. For now, I've bypassed the problem by forwarding my landline calls to my cell, but I'd still like to know what's going on.

- AT&T tells me a repair date of 6/29. Kind of a pain when I'm job hunting. It sounds like a problem on their end, but is there anything I can tell them that will help them understand what the problem is and expedite this?

Thanks!

weedonpaul
I have the same problem, My

I have the same problem, My telephone provider is primustel but the line was installed by BT. i have a panasonic dect phone but i had the same problem with bt cordless phones. To all intensive purposes the phone works, but it doesn't ring. the really annoying thing is that it's intermediate so when the engineer came round it worked. aaahhhhh.

I thought i was loosing my mind but am glad to hear i'm not alone

pooch785
ANSWER to why phone won't

ANSWER to why phone won't ring. My answering machine stopped ringing and putting a hard wired phone on the line did not ring also.I measured the voltage on the two main wires to the jack, it should be 52 volts a/c, but when the ringing part of the signal is going to the phone it dropped to 5 volts a/c. this is not enough to set off the ring in the phone Call your phone company, and have them check the ring voltage.

meatjerry
Hi all who have had the

Hi all who have had the "phone won't ring" problem with their Panasonic cordless phones. I had the same problem, which started suddenly on Aug.31, 2011. I could use the cordless phone(s) to call out, but no ring for incoming calls, answering machine wouldn't pick up, and, of course, no caller ID. Took my phone across the street to a friend's, and it rang there. Brought her phone here, and it wouldn't ring. My corded phones were working just fine.Called the AT&T repair center, and was told, of course, that is must be my equipment. The AT&T technical was here about 9 a.m.today, and fortunately I was home because all tested find out at the box. When he tried his own phone inside the house it did not work! Long story short. He replaced something called the "power card" and the phone immediately worked properly. No charge to me as I pay for inside line service.

Wheaux Dat
Having the EXACT same problem

Having the EXACT same problem with my Vtech phone. Working fine for 2 years, yesterday stopped ringing, no ans machine pick up.
Am about to call ATT (my DSL service).
Thanks, will let you know.

meatjerry
Good luck. If you're incoming

Good luck. If you're incoming voltage is down a bit, the signal for ringing your cordless won't be high enough. Make sure the tech tests his phone inside the house. BTW, he also said that more than six phones in the house (a cordless with add-ons only counts as one) puts an extra drain on the power. Best to schedule a specific date and time when you can him into the house.(course, you have to give them that four-hour window).

Wheaux Dat
Found out the next day that

Found out the next day that some neighbors also had phone problems (don't know if it was exactly the same.) Phone co. came out and worked in the area (not our house) and problem was solved - phone rings now.
Tropical storm Lee had just dumped lots of rain and wind (limbs down, etc.) over the previous 3 - 4 days, so there may have been some damage to some of the phone service without disrupting it completely.
Feel that there is something to the "decreased voltage coming into the house, so that it doesn't set off the ringer" theory. Likely the storms caused some decrease in the service in our area and the techs were able to repair/redo the wiring.
Now we have our ringing phone and answering machine.
Thanks to all for all of the help and advice in these posts.

chrisinPA
Same problem here in the

Same problem here in the states.. can make calls, can't receive. old wired phones work both ways. We've had a LOT of rain lately.

chrisinPA
Same problem here in the

Same problem here in the states.. can make calls, can't receive. old wired phones work both ways. We've had a LOT of rain lately.

chrisinPA
Same problem here in the

Same problem here in the states.. can make calls, can't receive. old wired phones work both ways. We've had a LOT of rain lately.

Sameer
This worked for me! Phone

This worked for me! Phone just got hooked up yesterday and while the phone works fine, it just wouldn't ring (only flashed). I was searching the net for answers and found what worked for me. Wanted to come back to this thread to share. You just have to reset the phone by taking the battery out and unpluging the base.

Please follow the instructions below to reset your phone:
Remove the battery from the handset of your phone.
Unplug the power cable from the base of the Vtech.
Reconnect the power cable to the base after a few minutes.
Reinsert the battery into the handset.
Put the handset in the handset cradle of the base. This will allow the devices to re-establish a link.

Sameer
I should have added that my

I should have added that my phone is a vtech 5.8. The manual says that by doing the steps above, it resets the phone so it can establish a new connection.

Loodley
Hi

Hi
Have trawled internet looking for a solution to our phone problem:This thread gives me hope!
6 months ago our digital phones [cordless] stopped working. We returned them to JohnLewis [fabulous as ever] who checked phones and said were fine but replaced for brand new BT digital cordless phones.
smixsell - your problems sounds like ours.
Our new phones wouldn't work
The BT engineer came and spevt 2 hours and couldn't get to work - although CORDED phones [old, curly wire one] would. Charged us £150 call out, can't afford to call out again.
BUT we still don't have digital phones which work in our house AND our corded phones, we have two, have both stopped ringing out - although, bizarrely, if you know someone is about to call and time it right you can pick up the phone to catch your caller and you can phone out - although crackly.
Throughout all of this internet [BT] has been fine.
400 year old house, small cottage, not overly thick walls
ANY ideas???

Loodley
Hi

Hi
Have trawled internet looking for a solution to our phone problem:This thread gives me hope!
6 months ago our digital phones [cordless] stopped working. We returned them to JohnLewis [fabulous as ever] who checked phones and said were fine but replaced for brand new BT digital cordless phones.
smixsell - your problems sounds like ours.
Our new phones wouldn't work
The BT engineer came and spevt 2 hours and couldn't get to work - although CORDED phones [old, curly wire one] would. Charged us £150 call out, can't afford to call out again.
BUT we still don't have digital phones which work in our house AND our corded phones, we have two, have both stopped ringing out - although, bizarrely, if you know someone is about to call and time it right you can pick up the phone to catch your caller and you can phone out - although crackly.
Throughout all of this internet [BT] has been fine.
400 year old house, small cottage, not overly thick walls
ANY ideas???

meatjerry
Have you tried both your

Have you tried both your cordless and corded phones at a friend's house? Just plug them (try each type separately) and call the friend's number from a call phone. If they work, it's clearly not your equipment. Your service provider should not charge you again if the problem is not enough voltage coming into your house or something on their end. That's a problem that should be covered with your basic service. If your phones don't work at a friend's (or neighbor's) house, then you may have an inside line problem, and the tech should have been able to solve that during his first visit. Ask for a more experienced technician.

Loodley
thanks - yes - the eqipment

thanks - yes - the eqipment works elsewhere - but BT [our service provider] say that as the line to the house is working [we can make calls and receive them as long as we know to pick up receiver] then the issue is ours...

pooch785
When I had the problem of the

When I had the problem of the phone not ringing, a service guy came out. I had checked the voltage myself and when my phone was supposed to ring the voltage went way low. After the sevice guy left the phone rang for half a day. I checked the voltage again, and it was staying around 54 volts when it was supposed to ring. Come to find out that its supposed to be around 90 volts on the ring. I told the telephone co. that I had low ringer voltage. They came and Its been working ever since.

Mike-Kanata
This seems to be a fairly

This seems to be a fairly common problem. I'm with Bell Canada and have 4 outlets on my house phone number. On those outlets I have one 2-handset DECT 6 VTech cordless, one GE Dect 6 cordless with answering machine, one GE wall phone with electronic ringer (not cordless) and one old non-cordless phone with mechanical bell. Last Friday we noticed that the only phone that was ringing was the VTech. Not even the GE cordless was detecting the incoming call. I did some troubleshooting and discovered that, in fact, the old mechanical bell telephone was actually making a very low knocking sound (too low to be heard at any distance) instead of ringing. This suggested that there was insufficient current to activate the bell. I disconnected the old 'phone and, low and behold, the GE wall 'pnone started to work but not the GE cordless (which has a longer cable run).

I consulted a friend who is a telecom engineer and he told me that Bell had likely changed their equipment or a line card in the switch and were supplying a lower current. (Part of the "greening" of technology). He also said that it was no good complaining to Bell as they would just say it was my old equipment that was causing the problem.

I continued to operate with just the VTech and GE wall 'phone until this morning. Then, some time between 9am and 11am the situation changed and everything started working again.

I can only assume that someone else on this switch complained and the Bell decided to restore the voltage. However, there is a warning here that if the phone companies decide, in the interests of "greening" to reduce the current supplied to indicate incoming calls, there is probably nothing we can do about it. They will just be obsoleting older equipment in much the same way we are seeing older TVs obsoleted as the world moves to digital.

Loodley
thanks for this

thanks for this
we've still hasd no resolution - with digital and brand new equipment....

pooch785
Mine was fixed after two

Mine was fixed after two times with the phone company, by telling them the ringer voltage was to low [working it goes to around 95 volts when the ring pulse is made, 53 volts when not ringing.] also if you have corrosion [wet weather?] on any part of your connection from the phone to the telephone pole the votage can be good at their end but not at your end.

Loodley
really helpful - thanks! - I

really helpful - thanks! - I'm onto BT now....

Mike-Kanata
Loodley said: really helpful

Loodley said: really helpful - thanks! - I'm onto BT now....

One thing to watch for  - I don't know how common this is but in the Bell Canada area, the subscriber is responsible for the internal wiring. Bell cover their wires up to the house. Before calling the telco, make sure you have checked your equipment and your internal wiring otherwise, if the telco troubleshoots and decides the problem is on your side, they will charge you for their time.

This problem is not generally caused by modern cordless phones (though, as I found, if the voltage is marginal, an older mechanical phone can drag things down and prevent phones on other outlets working. If that is even part of the problem, the telco will likely put the blame on the subscriber.) 

One last point. It greatly helps if you have another number you can use to troubleshoot the problem. In my case I have another line in the house (that operates from a separate switch) so I just kept calling from that line as I moved the various phones around the different outlets on the faulty line. A cell phone will work just as well.

casualmtg
I was having the same problem

I was having the same problem with my cordless phones for the past couple weeks. They had worked fine up until then. I have about 6 in the house on one line...most of them Panasonics but recently added 3 Vtechs (5.8 ghz). At first I thought it was the Vtechs causing my problem, but eliminating them didn't cure the problem. Then I thought it was because I just changed from AT&T DSL to Road Runner cable, thinking maybe AT&T somehow sabotaged my line when disconnecting the DSL. I removed all the DSL filters from all the phones, but to no avail. I did have an all-in-one Netgear DSL modem / wireless N dual band router that I had to replace to accomodate the cable modem. So, in it's place I hooked up a Netgear wireless G router. It occured to me when I set this other router up, I noticed it had a drop down selection for different channels. I just left it at it's default channel 11.

Well, I just went into it again and changed that channel to 5 (a random choice) and what do you know...all my phones now ring again and answering machines pick up too (although I only leave one turned on). It seems to make sense and is logical that hard wired phones still rang. Apparently the wireless frequencies must interfere with one another. Try it and see if this doesn't solve your problems. I, like most of you, was going batty trying to figure out why this was happening. I'm also surprised (maybe not) that other techs couldn't figure this out (like AT&T and Panasonic techs).

chezzzza
Fixed mine
Fixed mine Ihad this issue all day at work, the phone wouldnt not ring I thought it was the work software Then tonight went to go to work again and worked out its not work its my own phone not ringing in, i could ring out ok, but calls coming in would not ring or flash.   Read this and bi passed the splitter and walah it worked so dug around for a new spillter, connected it up. and wahlahh im working again. phones calling in and out and flashing now ty Dave , without my phones i cant work xxx
ChuckBaker
I think Shamrock is on the
I think Shamrock is on the right track there. I have the same problem as everyone else but I have noticed a pattern. My cordless phone works fine when it is clear and dry outside but if it storms really hard as it did last night then the ringer and answering system on my cordless phone quits working. I guess I am going to have to call the phone company and have them check their wiring and voltage output.

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