BlackBerry

[djrupey]

It's a mobile phone - ie. stick it in your pocket.

And who hangs on for more than 30 seconds waiting for someone to pick up the phone?

If the mobile is taking the place of a landline in a busy garage workshop such as my own, I might be under a car and need time to get out from under it and answer. I am not in the habit of stuffing a phone worth several hundred £ in my overalls pocket along with assorted spanners and greasy hands. Especially one as delicate as the Storm.

Agreed, in most instances 30 seconds is more than enough to grab the phone and answer. But my points are that a) there should be the functionality for longer ringing if the user desires it and b) it should not come out of the box ringing for all of ten seconds and b) the option to change the ringing time should be clear and obvious to the user, not actuated by a stupid secret code that you only find out by going on forums or ringing helplines (as my brother did).

[bigrob]

I was being tongue in cheek on the first part.

Of course it should be something that you can set to ring as long as you want.

I want to be able to set how long my "default" items last for in the calendar. Could do it years and years ago on my old SE phone, but not on my Blackberrys.

[bryan990]

I have read this thread with care and thought that I might find something more helpful on the Blackberry site. The answer there is that the Service Provider is the organisation which sets the limit on ring time before transfer to the answering service. Some have a limit others do not.

If that is true, this is a vodafone issue rather than one which originates from the equipment. Can we please have a simple definative statement from Vodefone which clarifies where the 30 second limit comes from.

I must say that it sounds more plausable that it is a limitation imposed by Vodafone than one builtinto the BB Storm.

I eagerly await a straightforward reply and a solution if it is a Vodafone set limitation.

[bryan990]

Further to my earlier post, the following is a direct quote from the BB site

"The amount of time or the number of rings before a call is diverted to voice mail service is controlled by the service provider's network. While some service providers may choose to lock these options down, others may allow you to change them.

Additional Information Contact your service provider to find out whether these options are locked down, or if you can get a list of Global System for Mobile Communications®(GSM®) Service Codes and instructions on how to change the settings. "

[djrupey]

I have read this thread with care and thought that I might find something more helpful on the Blackberry site. The answer there is that the Service Provider is the organisation which sets the limit on ring time before transfer to the answering service. Some have a limit others do not.

If that is true, this is a vodafone issue rather than one which originates from the equipment. Can we please have a simple definative statement from Vodefone which clarifies where the 30 second limit comes from.

I must say that it sounds more plausable that it is a limitation imposed by Vodafone than one builtinto the BB Storm.

I eagerly await a straightforward reply and a solution if it is a Vodafone set limitation.

Funnily enough since posting my earlier comments I have surmised the same thing. Perhaps Vodafone would like to comment?

[dai_uk]

Funnily enough since posting my earlier comments I have surmised the same thing. Perhaps Vodafone would like to comment?

It would be nice, but I bet they don't.

It might be worth mentioning my old HTC TYTN had the same problem, I trawled the menus on that and never found how to alter it. So it looks like it may well be down to VF.

Think about it costs people on PAYG to call back calls they missed or listen to voice mail.

[dai_uk]

Funnily enough since posting my earlier comments I have surmised the same thing. Perhaps Vodafone would like to comment?

It would be nice, but I bet they don't.

It might be worth mentioning my old HTC TYTN had the same problem, I trawled the menus on that and never found how to alter it. So it looks like it may well be down to VF.

Think about it costs people on PAYG to call back calls they missed or listen to voice mail.

Not sure how I managed to post this twice or how to delete it. Over to you MOD's if you can get shot to save space / my face.

Thanks

[bryan990]

Well another day and no reply from Vodafone - our service provider. Research has shown that this issue was raised in this thread nearly three months ago and the issue has also been raised by BB Storm users on several other sites. It seems that there are a lot of people who are unhappy about this silly snag on an otherwise splendid system. Could it be that someone, somewhere has made a poor decision and is now hiding deep in the long grass in the hope that we will get fed up and move on.

Well, let me say now that I won't. I still hope for a simple and straightforward solution to a widespread problem. I don't believe that it can be difficult to find a solution. Perhaps there is not a will to do so?

Come on Vodafone, you are a Service Provider - why not try providing a service?

[djrupey]

Yes, well this is really beginning to ###### me off now. You know, it never even crossed my mind that the ring time would be limited, and certainly not limited to a derisory ten seconds unless you have the Scret Code.

So believe it or not, I've had my Storm for nearly a year now, and for much of that time, and certainly in the first few months, I NEVER REALISED I WAS MISSING CALLS. Sure, I eventually saw the Missed Call notice and called them back. But sometimes it was too late. The customer had gone elsewhere. I just put it down to me being busy in my car noisy workshop and not hearing the ringing. How much business have I lost because of this? I will never know.

I had my Nokia 6110 for ten years, and it would ring and ring and ring until I answered. Sure, there must have been occasions when the ringing expired, just like a land line. But I never had to make a dash for the phone lest it revert to voicemail before I got to it.

So it never, ever crossed my mind that this brief ring allowance was DELIBERATE. I just thought that either I had missed the ringing, or it was yet another fault of the phone, to go along with all the other faults of the Storm 1. So I thought, oh I must listen out for my phone more and/or maybe it will be fixed with the next OS update.

Now that I seems this may be deliberate policy by Vodafone I am hopping mad. I won't let this rest. It is b---y outrageous. Here we have one of the most cutting edge phones in the land, an expensive handset, and it doesn't even f----g perform a basic function of a phone, which is to RING and RING and RING.

[bryan990]

Ok yet another day gone and no response from Vodafone.

I will now start pestering the Senior end of the organisation with complaints. Results, if any will be posted

[dai_uk]

Ok yet another day gone and no response from Vodafone.

I will now start pestering the Senior end of the organisation with complaints. Results, if any will be posted

Looks like we may have another thread that the Mods have been told to avoid. Gf on O2 hers is about the same on a Samsung thingy... not looked to see if can be altered. Maybe they all at it.

[bryan990]

As promised, I have contacted Vodafone Customer Services. The reply was entirely inappropriate as follows;

"I understand that you are unable to answer your calls as it gets transferred to your voicemail. This is why you want to prolong the ring duration.You will be pleased to know you can extend the ring duration to a maximum of 30 seconds before the call is diverted to voicemail. To change the ring duration you will need to dial **61*+447836121121*10*(5 - 30 seconds)# send.
I’m glad to have helped you with the code to change the ring duration.

I have replied that this is not helpful and asked for an answer to the problem which has been identified on this forum several times and by several BB/Vodafone users. I will post the reply when it comes.

[bryan990]

I really don't know where all the superfluous characters came from. I hope that the sense remains clear and/or the moderator will be able to clean up my last post to this thread.

[dai_uk]

Even if you could alter the time it rang for before going to voicemail, it would not do much good as the battery would not be able to cope.

Still no feedback from a MOD on this one so I'm guessing there's nothing that can be done about it.

[bryan990]

The latest reply from Vodafone is below.

Thank you for your email. Let me see what can I do to help.

I do understand the 30 seconds seems to be short for you to answer the calls. The ringing duration of Vodafone has for Voicemail is 30 seconds and that's is the maximum length for the call to divert to the Voicemail. Voicemail is mainly use for I if a phone is out of coverage, switched off, engaged, or the customer does not answer, calls can be diverted to Voicemail so that the caller can leave a message. If the ringing duration of voicemail is set for 2 minutes, the caller may drop the call after 20 seconds ringing and unable to leave you a message.

I do hope above information is useful. If you are not please with the Voicemail, to cancel the Voicemail, you can dial 1210 from your handset.

It seems that the Vodafone reply is to stop the voicemail service and then your phone will ring for as long as the caller likes to hold. This means that you can have a second class service rather than the one you are paying for. I'm not finished yet - watch this spac.

[bryan990]

I have exchanged several emails with Vodafone Customer Services. The latest is set out below

From Customer Services. I will be glad to assist you with the voicemail details.

I regret to learn of the recent difficulty you have experienced. Vodafone endeavour to provide the highest possible level of service to all of our customers, I understand that you feel in this case we have failed to meet your expectations however you will agree to me that it due to technical blocks.

I do appreciate your custom and I can only imagine how frustrating this would have been for you and I will like to apologise for the distress that this has caused you.
Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.

Please rest assured that all of your comments in relation to the service that you've received will be fed back and addressed internally to help us improve the level of service that we provide to all of our customers. We take this issue very seriously and want you to know that this sort of service will not go un-noticed.
Your feedback is very important to us and will allow us to serve you with products and services matched even better to your exact needs in the future.
Currently, I am sorry to confirm
the maximum ring duration of a Voicemail can be set to 30 seconds only. I trust the above information helps.
When all the emollient marketing speak is removed it comes down to "tough luck - we are not planning to do anything about this".
Well I think they should address the issue as a matter of urgency and I shall now be taking it to the exexutive level of Vodafone UK. If that doesn't get a positive response there are several other more public routes to use. Watch this space.

[dai_uk]

I think 2mins would be to long for somebody to hold on before hanging-up, but I would like to have a choice of how long before going to VM. I would think 45secs - 1min would be my choice.

Note the word 'choice' Seems this is getting less & less these days. Only choice we seem to get is 'Take it or leave it'

[djrupey]

More missed or dropped calls yesterday. I love my Storm in many ways but as a mobile phone I am afraid it is not a patch on my ten-year-old Nokia 6110. I am seriously thinking of reactivating it just to use as a phone. I'll keep the Storm for other stuff. I can't be ###### with all the hassle, the stupid limits of ringing before going to Voicemail, the stupid Mute button, the precarious signal strength, the delay between pressing the green reply button and something happening. I'm not a phone geek, I'm a businessman, and I'm not interested in my mobile phone as a technological challenge. I just want it to do what it says on the tin.

So a warm welcome back to my Nokia 6110, born circa 1998. You never let me down, not once, not ever. You found a signal in the most remote places, down on the beach, hidden behind cliffs, up in the hills, down remote valleys when mountain biking. Having locked onto a signal, you held it fast, and never let it go. You rang and rang until I answered. You never, ever dropped a call, not in ten long years. You were crisp and clear. Nobody ever had a conversation with me that went along the lines of "Hello! hello! hello? can you HEAR me??!!**" I never once had to run to a landline and call someone back because my mobile phone had cast them away.

As a mobile telephone, Storm 1 v. Nokia 6110, there's no contest. So much for progress.