Landline Integration Issues

Having trouble placing or receiving calls or using your voicemail system on Ooma Telo VoIP Phones? Post your questions here.
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Euclidw
Posts:12
Joined:Mon Jan 04, 2010 1:45 pm
Landline Integration Issues

Post by Euclidw » Mon Jan 04, 2010 2:48 pm

Hello Everyone.

This is my first post, but I've been lurking for several months. Many of your posts helped me make the decision to purchase Ooma! Unfortunately, I am having several problems with the Telo and as forewarned by many of you telephone support has been of little/no help. Let me explain my set-up first then I will get into the problems.

I have AT&T DSL service. The DSL modem feeds my router & the Ooma is plugged into the router (its a Apple time capsule and based on many of the posts here for my set-up it seems this is the best configuration).

I have my DSL filtered land line plugged into the Ooma's "wall port" and a cordless phone base is plugged into the Ooma's "Phone port".

I also have one regular landline phone connected to a separate phone jack (dsl filtered) in my house.

When setting up the Ooma I selected to integrate the Ooma with my existing landline number. I did this for several reasons. First Ooma, did not have any numbers in my area code. Secondly, I have an alarm system and entry gate system so want to keep a land line.

Here are my problems:
1) About 25% of the time incoming calls ring on my connected land line but do not ring through Ooma. I originally thought there was simply a delay as some have mentioned, but I've let it ring 3-4 times before answering the landline & Ooma never rings. The other strange thing is when I answer the landline (when Ooma doesn't ring), if I pick up the Ooma I get a Ooma dial-tone so there is no way to pick the call up with my cordless phones that are connected through Ooma and talk with the person who called me.

2) When someone presses my gate buzzer, my land line rings with a special ring. This ring is not passed through to the Ooma phones. There are a few posts about this, but with landline integration my understanding was this would pass through

* I've spoken with phone support for both of these issues; however, what they are saying isn't logical. They are claiming somehow the incoming calls to my number (which has not been ported to Ooma) are now VOIP & the reason the one landline rings is because Ooma is taking the VOIP call & distributing it to my landline. I'm pretty sure that is wrong & for incoming calls Ooma is simply passing the landline calls through the Ooma connected phones.

Can anyone can explain exactly how the landline integration works? Also any help on my two problems will be much appreciated.

Euclidw
Posts:12
Joined:Mon Jan 04, 2010 1:45 pm

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by Euclidw » Tue Jan 05, 2010 9:09 am

I've had more frustrating discussions with customer service (my ticket number was lost so I had to explain the issues from the beginning). I'm now waiting for a call back from engineering. I've also sent a detailed e-mail but haven't heard back.

I'd appreciate any assistance.

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bw1
Posts:1781
Joined:Wed Mar 18, 2009 9:06 am
Location:MI

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by bw1 » Tue Jan 05, 2010 9:22 am

There is some info on the forum about the issues. I don't know if you've seen them all, but you could check these to see:

search.php?keywords=landline+integratio ... mit=Search

search.php?keywords=gate&terms=all&auth ... mit=Search

Most of us would tell you to keep the landline and Ooma service separate.

Euclidw
Posts:12
Joined:Mon Jan 04, 2010 1:45 pm

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by Euclidw » Tue Jan 05, 2010 11:59 am

Thanks for responding. I did search the forums and have read all the posts related to my issue. The problem is many of the posts refer to the Hub (on the Gate issue in particular). The confusing thing is in reading all the posts, some people have been able to get things to work & others have not.

dustydaniels
Posts:17
Joined:Thu Dec 03, 2009 12:43 pm

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by dustydaniels » Tue Jan 05, 2010 3:27 pm

Getting the integrated landline to work with the Telo is hit or miss. What I ended up doing until my landline # is ported over is request "Fixed Call Forward All Calls/No Answer" from my Telco and provided them with my new Ooma # to forward the calls. Caller-id works regardless of weather you have the service on your landline or not, so you can cancel the service if you have it. Now your Telo will ring with caller-id regardless of what phone # is called. I don't know if calls from your gate will forward, but it might ring thru to the wall Jack of the Telo if you leave the landline plugged in.

Euclidw
Posts:12
Joined:Mon Jan 04, 2010 1:45 pm

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by Euclidw » Tue Jan 12, 2010 11:15 am

Still trying to get my problems resolved. I now have two additional problems: 1) sometimes when people call me the phone rings once then they hear a "fax sound". 2) sometimes the Telo will ring once then stop, but my landline connected phone keeps ringing. When I check myooma call log. The number is there as a missed call?

I didn't mention that one of the reasons I don't have an Ooma number is because for some reason Ooma has not been able to get a 312 area code number for me so I am still waiting for one.

Everytime I speak to customer support I get more confused (I've been waiting fora call back from engineering for about 2 wks).
Last night I was told by a supervisor that with integrated landline, when an outside caller calls my number it comes into Ooma, gets converted to VOIP & then comes into my telo via internet? Everything I've read on the forum indicates that the integrated landline set-up just passes incoming calls through the landline wire to my Ooma telo connected phones. Does anyone know how it actually works?

Thanks again everyone for your help.

Euclidw
Posts:12
Joined:Mon Jan 04, 2010 1:45 pm

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by Euclidw » Wed Jan 13, 2010 6:12 pm

Problem solved! After a couple weeks of calling. I finally spoke with an engineer. He knew exactly what was wrong explained everything in 2 minutes & got my system working!
:D

Mleasure
Posts:1
Joined:Sat Jan 16, 2010 11:24 am

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by Mleasure » Sat Jan 16, 2010 11:26 am

So what was the problem?

Euclidw
Posts:12
Joined:Mon Jan 04, 2010 1:45 pm

Re: Landline Integration Issues

Post by Euclidw » Tue Jan 19, 2010 1:42 pm

In summary the problem was Ooma does not work well with landline integration. The engineer explained that the Telo system does not do a good job of passing the cooper wire signals through the Telo connected phones. He told me some phone carriers are better than others & the clearer the line the better. This made sense because my landline has always had a slight background hiss & has never been crystal clear. He also apologized for 1st tier technical support & told me the company has been very unhappy with them & knows they don't know what they are talking about.

With his assistance I got a new Ooma number in my area code (something I had been trying to do for weeks) & had my system configured (keeping my landline as a back-up and forwarding calls into that number to my new Ooma number).

Things are working great now! I do have one new problem (my caller ID is: Phong Tang (not my name) when I call someone) but I'm hoping its resolved in the next week. (I'll keep everyone posted).

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