Network Availability versus Call Forwarding

Posts: 80

I had something of a discovery today while doing some maintenance work on my home network.

Since my Internet connection was down, I was expecting inbound calls to my Vonage phone to forward to my mobile phone. I have my mobile designated as my fallback for a network availability issue. I also have Call Forwarding configured with "Simultaneous Ring" so that any call to my Vonage also rings my mobile so I can answer whichever is most convenient.

With my home network down, all of the calls to my Vonage went straight to voicemail. They didn't ring my mobile phone as I would have expected. I de-activated call waiting (and the simul-ring) and the network availability kicked in as planned. When I turned call waiting back on... it goes straight to voicemail again.

Anyone know why Simul-Ring breaks when your Vonage ATA goes offline? The network availability section of the website clearly states this doesn't work if Call Forwarding is enabled. Why doesn't call forwarding work if the ATA is down?

- Mark

Posts: 188 · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2005 3:44 am Post subject:

Hmmm that's strange because last week or so my net went down for like 20-30 mins and I tested the Network Availibility and it worked and I too had call forward on. I do recall my first issued number was doing the same thing your current number is doing so you may have to get a new number.

Posts: 87 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Feb 15, 2005 Posts: 87

I encountered something else unexpected yesterday.

I have SimulRing set to call my cell phone too. I did not realize that my cell phone was turned off. When someone called, it rang the home phone once and went straight to Vonage voicemail.

When I disabled SimulRing, the calls went through normally.

Does anyone know why Vonage VM (set to pick up after 25 sec) picked up instead of my cell phone's VM (picks up immediately when the phone is off) when this occured?

I actually prefer Vonage VM to pick up so no complaints.

rs

Posts: 196 · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2005 7:38 am Post subject: Re: Another unexpected thing...

rolands wrote:

I encountered something else unexpected yesterday.

I have SimulRing set to call my cell phone too. I did not realize that my cell phone was turned off. When someone called, it rang the home phone once and went straight to Vonage voicemail.

When I disabled SimulRing, the calls went through normally.

Does anyone know why Vonage VM (set to pick up after 25 sec) picked up instead of my cell phone's VM (picks up immediately when the phone is off) when this occured?

I actually prefer Vonage VM to pick up so no complaints.

rs

That's odd. I would have thought the cell phone voice mail would get the call since it was turned off. Some cellular providers will send an ISDN REDIRECT message back when the call is sent to voice mail which enables the controlling switch to pull the call back to local voice mail. Not many carriers have been doing that. I guess you can count yourself lucky to have it.

Posts: 318 · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2005 11:02 am Post subject:

http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic3094.html

I outlined a list of several bugs related to simulring. If you are using simulring and EITHER PHONE is disconnected, it will go immediately to vociemail. About 10% of the time it goes to my cell phone's voicemail, the rest of the time Vonage (I have the timing configured so that it should always go to Vonage voicemail).

Additionally, if your network is down you'll be lucky to hear one ring on your cell phone before it immediately goes to Vonage voicemail. This is some sort of bug with simulring.

Posts: 244 · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2005 11:22 am Post subject:

Yep, simul ring causes this. Turn it off if you can

Posts: 5 · New Forum Member Joined: Feb 28, 2005 Posts: 5

I have simulring activated on my account in order to call my cell phone. The cell phones voicemail is disabled, so if no one picks up in 25 secs, the call goes to Vonage voicemail.
It appears that when my internet connection goes down, calls go straight to voicemail. This is not the desired behavior, and doesn't appear to be to spec. if simulring is considered a kind of call forwarding. Adding my cell phone as a network availability number doesn't work because there is no way to get to the Vonage voicemail if I don't pick up the cell.

Desired behavior: Have simulring work as normal if unable to connect with Vonage phone. That is - ring all numbers it can, and then go to voicemail after the allotted time.

Anybody know a good workaround?
The benefit of this configuration, by the way, is that I don't have to give out two numbers to people to contact me - they just use the Vonage one, and I only have to check that one voicem mail.