CallerID when calling Area Codes 206 and 360

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

To: Vonage Customer Care [sent via their web submission form]
Subject: I have problems with Caller ID

Description of Problem:
Whenever I (or any other Vonage customer) calls numbers in Washington State, the wrong caller ID is displayed. The called party in Washington sees an incorrect number.

Specifically, when calling 360-526-xxxx the called party sees 213-341-0400 instead of my number. When calling 206-203-xxxx the called party sees 206-812-0513 instead of my number.

If I call either of these numbers from another carrier, e.g. Sprint or Broadvoice, the correct calling number is displayed to the called party.

Before you ask, I am NOT blocking my caller ID. My caller ID works correctly to most other called parties.

Since the display is correct for calls from other carriers, it seems that the problem must be a Vonage problem, not a problem at the called location. I have checked this from all of my Vonage lines, as well as from the Vonage line I had for the Motorola field test, and from Vonage lines of friends. It fails from all Vonage lines that I have tried.

/john

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

Got a reply:

Thank you for contacting Customer Care.

We understand from your email that when you call Washington the wrong Caller ID number is displayed.

We would like to know if you experience this when calling from 1-(978)-263-xxxx or 1-(978)-405-xxxx or 1-(678)-935-xxxx (SoftPhone). Check if their provider is blocking the Caller ID information of Vonage callers. We request you to also reply us the WAN MAC address of your Vonage device.

If you have any questions now or in the future Vonage Customer Care is eager to assist you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Please visit our help center at http://www.vonage.com/help.php or send us an email from our Contact Us page at http://www.vonage.com/help_contactUs.php. You can also call us Toll Free at: 1-VONAGE-HELP 1-866-243-4357.

Sincerely,

Vonage Customer Care

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

Apparently didn't save my response back to them.

Told them it was not only from all three of my lines, but also from other Vonage customer's lines.

Told them that they could call the 206 and 360 numbers I had given them at any time, and enter certain codes, and have the callerID read back to them.

Told them that the called party's carrier was not blocking incoming Vonage callerID, that what was being displayed were Vonage numbers, just not my Vonage number.

Told them the MAC address was obviously irrelevant, since it happens not just from my ATA but also from my Softphone and from other people's ATAs, but gave it to them anyway.

Waiting for the next response.

Posts: 100 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Jan 13, 2007 Posts: 100

seems it needs to addressed by engineering department.call vonage and ask for Tier 2 so that they can create a ticket for engineers

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

One would hope that when you select "Troubleshooting and Technical Support" on the customer support web form that it would go to people who would pass it up to the Tier 2 support after at most one round of clarification with the customer.

Posts: 1178 · Member of the Week Joined: Feb 28, 2005 Posts: 1178

jcovert wrote:

One would hope that when you select "Troubleshooting and Technical Support" on the customer support web form that it would go to people who would pass it up to the Tier 2 support after at most one round of clarification with the customer

Unfortunately, these first level CSRs do not always think big picture. They simply try to solve everything on their own and unless you specifically request Tier 2 or 3, you won't get it moved up the chain.

I wish your assumption was true but in most cases, it isn't in my experience of reading posts here.

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

In response to your email, I understand you are experiencing an issue with your CallerID.

A request has been submitted to our engineering department to correct this problem, please allow 24-72 hours for this issue to be resolved. If you have any questions now or in the future Vonage Customer Care is eager to assist you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. ...

Posts: 327 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Dec 13, 2005 Posts: 327

I also have a 206-203-XXXX number, which is an IPKall DID that I have forwarded to a WiFi phone on FWD. When I call it from Vonage, I get a different Caller ID. When I call from Voicestick, I get nothing at all - unless I dial as an international call, then I get still another caller ID (not right, not the one that comes from Vonage).

If I dial from Verizon PSTN, I get the correct caller ID and if I dial from Stanaphone, I get the correct Caller ID.

My guess here is that Vonage and Voicestick are contracting with the same gateway operator in WA as IPKall, which causes IP to IP calling problems with Caller ID. The other guys probably come into IPKall from the PSTN - so things work right.

My guess here is that Vonage may not be able to fix this one if your numbers are on IPKall.

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

I know for a fact that Vonage is going through the PSTN to reach IPkall. I don't know, but I suspect, that Vonage has CallerID issues with regular landline numbers in those areas.

Posts: 153 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Jan 11, 2007 Posts: 153

They claim to have fixed it, but have not:

From: SMTP%"service@vonage.com"
To: vonage@xxxxx.xxx
Subj: [vonage.com #102nnnnn] OB CID Focal [E-Mail]

This is an auto response email message. Please do not respond.

Your ticket number <102nnnnn> has been resolved for your outbound caller id, you can now retest it to see if it is working correctly.

If you have any questions now or in the future, please contact Vonage Customer Care 24 hours a day, 7 days a week by calling us Toll Free at: 1-VONAGE-HELP (1-866-243-4357) or by visiting the help center of our website at http://www.vonage.com/help.php?lid=nav_help

--------

I reopened the ticket as follows (submitted on the Web Form):

I just received the following response from Vonage:

"Your ticket number <102xxxxx> has been resolved for your outbound caller id, you can now retest it to see if it is working correctly."

However, the problem has not been corrected. I can reproduce the problem at will, but now on some calls the caller ID is correct (this is an improvement), yet on most it is still incorrect.

You can reproduce the problem as follows from any Vonage phone:

Dial 1-360-526-xxxx then enter 958 at the prompt.
Caller ID is correct only occasionally, most of the time it is wrong.

Dial 1-206-203-xxxx then enter 1-xxx-x958 at the prompt. Caller ID is always wrong.

If I call these numbers on another carrier, e.g. Broadvoice, the caller ID is always correct.

/john