BT Digital Voice

[Hroth]

4 hours ago, Metr0Land said:

 

Can you please give some details how you did this?  Blowed if I can see how.  I need to configure my home phone and a friend's.  Tks.

 

As far as I can see it the options are to

 

1. Get BT to disable DV voice mail completely
2. Set the DV Voicemail timeout to the maximum permissible (30 seconds I believe) and configure your DECT answerphone to cut in sooner.

You need a DV handset to configure the Smart Hub 2 DECT settings...

 

I might have misread - you actually have to go into Voicemail by dialling 1571 and manipulating things from there. So it might be possible from an ordinary DECT handset.

 

Here's what the Essentials handset instruction "book" says:

 

Voicemail (1571)
This service answers your calls when
you can’t. Callers can leave a message,
which you can hear by dialling 1571.

If you’ve got messages waiting for you
to listen to, you’ll see lit up and hear
an alert (if set). You can also see the
number of messages waiting for you.

Press to listen to your messages.

You can also record your own personal
greeting or change the ringer delay
from this menu.

 

A longer ringer delay will give your home answerphone a chance to pick up before the Voicemail one.

 

 

 

Edited February 8, 2022 by Hroth
Spelin (again) and added info

[woodenhead]

David Mitchell, the general voice of reason these days agrees\https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/14/its-good-to-talk-unless-youre-a-bt-customer

 

Some comment from ThisIsMoney on landline usage from April 21.

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-9495695/Number-homes-landline-fallen-4m-20-years.html

 

I too am concerned by the end of landlines.  However, it is not BT's fault is it, they are a private company who owned the landlines when landlines were how we connected our homes to the wider phone, dial up and early broadband.  Clearly the Government did not place any committment upon BT to be the phone line supplier of last resort and as technology has developed and landline usage dropped BT are now faced with a cost of replacing something that most people do not use.

 

I can imagine the capital cost of wholesale replacement of the architecture is staggering for something that most people are not using and without Government cash they are not going to do it.  In addition it sounds like BT will make further savings by not renewing leases on exchanges, another reason it will want rid of them.

 

But we are entering a new age, one where we are so much more connected yet at the same time on a precipace where an environmental incident or agent of chaos could unleash malware that could cripple power or communications equipment and when we really needed to contact the emergency services we would not be able to

[john new]

Hopefully this is not a stupid question - how does this affect Sky voice and broadband customers? I understand the final links and exchange are actually via BT’s network but I am not a telecoms expert so could well be wrong.

[woodenhead]

40 minutes ago, john new said:

Hopefully this is not a stupid question - how does this affect Sky voice and broadband customers? I understand the final links and exchange are actually via BT’s network but I am not a telecoms expert so could well be wrong.

And TalkTalk and the Yorkshire one.

 

They all use the BT Network, only Virgin have their own network that they inherited from the cable companies.

 

BT Openreach manage the network, the other companies purchase capacity of that network for their own dedicated traffic to the local exhanges, from their it is purely BT equipment.

[Hroth]

Delaying DV Voicemail

 

I've found that the easiest way for a BT customer to change the Voicemail delay is to go to bt.com and log into MyBT

 

Navigate to Your Products -> Digital Voice, click the Manage button on Voicemail essentials and select the delay time. The default is 4 rings/12 seconds.  I set mine to 30 seconds.

 

If you set your home answerphone to less than that, it should pick up before DV Voicemail.

 

Update:

 

Set my home answerphone to respond after 8 rings.  On testing, it cut in as required. 

Now. Should I record my own greeting, or leave it to the robot voice??? 

 

Edited February 10, 2022 by Hroth

[uax6]

The system X exchange problems can be quite easily overcome ( I have a friend who has actually redesigned a System X line card to use modern components (and found that it occupies about ta quarter of the old card space)), and you could probably have quite large exchanges in street cabinets now, but its the space for the lines to be terminated that is an issue, and of course that BT are using the scrap value of the copper (and ally) in the ground to help pay for the new digital stuff...

 

If only Offcom had insisted on the equipment not failing owing to power failure at the BT end....

 

Andy G

[Metr0Land]

Just when you think BT can't lower the bar.....

 

An envelope just dropped onto my mat.  On the outside it reads-  Please read: You need to take action to stay connected.

On opening the letter it's headed - Your landline network is being upgraded.  Make sure you're ready for Digital Voice

 

It's actually addressed to me by name, address and email ref, not 'The Occupier' so you'd think they might know they connected me to DV over a week ago?

 

 

(In fairness I should say whenever I've phoned BT recently they have been knowledgeable and helpful and generally try to help wthtout passing me off to someone else, it's just their direct marketing is total rubbish)

 

 

[Jonboy]

How up to date are the Royal Mail in your area? Our town is seeing some letters delayed for up to three or four weeks (there is another thread on it somewhere)?

[Hroth]

1 hour ago, Metr0Land said:

Just when you think BT can't lower the bar.....

 

An envelope just dropped onto my mat.  On the outside it reads-  Please read: You need to take action to stay connected.

On opening the letter it's headed - Your landline network is being upgraded.  Make sure you're ready for Digital Voice

 

I got an email from them on Tuesday titled "Your phone line has swicthed to Digital Voice"*

 

advising me that:

Quote

We've now moved your home phone service over to Digital Voice. If you haven't done so already, all you need to do to make and receive calls as normal and start enjoying the benefits of Digital Voice, is follow these quick steps:

and so on...

 

Left hand, meet Right hand!

 

* Perhaps the mis-spelling was to attract my attention, rather than fumble-fingered keyboarding....

[Metr0Land]

2 hours ago, Jonboy said:

How up to date are the Royal Mail in your area? Our town is seeing some letters delayed for up to three or four weeks (there is another thread on it somewhere)?

 

Our post is very good here. Despite living in the middle of nowhere it's generally fast. All operators seem to operate a hub and spoke system for mails/parcels and where we live seems to catch connections nicely in most directions most of the time.