‘Call Failed’ error when making calls

[Retired-George]

This issue has the following symptoms:

For version 1 Sure Signal (the one with four lights on the front):

• Lights one, two and four are all solid
• Incoming calls, texts and internet all work correctly
• When making a call on a registered phone, the error ‘Call Failed’ or similar is displayed

For version 2 Sure Signal (the one with 3 lights on the front):

• The power and system lights are both solid
• Incoming calls, texts and internet all work correctly
• When making a call on a registered phone, the error ‘Call Failed’ or similar is displayed 

For version 3 Sure Signal (the plug in version):

• The power, internet and service lights are all solid and the in use light is either solid or flashing
• Incoming calls, texts and internet all work correctly
• When making a call on a registered phone, the error ‘Call Failed’ or similar is displayed

Troubleshooting steps:

Check for planned maintenance:
Planned maintenance can cause periods of downtime, so check the forum for any planned maintenance. If there is, this will be announced at the top of the Sure Signal forum.

Reset your Sure Signal:

For versions 1 and 2:

1. Hold in the reset button until all lights go solid
2. Pull the power lead out with the reset button still pushed in
3. Continue to hold down the reset button and reconnect the power lead
4. Wait for all lights to come on and then release the reset button

For version 3:

1. Locate the button on the base of the box next to the Ethernet ports.
2. Press and hold the button for approximately 30 seconds.
3. Once the lights come back on, release the button.

The Sure Signal will be back online in around 1 hour.

If you’re still unable to make calls, there may be a compatibility issue with your Sure Signal and your location information (also known as SAC/LAC compatibility).

A SAC (Service Area Code) connects to a mast and is used to determine the rough location of where a call’s made. It's needed for the emergency services to know where a call was made from.

As a Sure Signal can be used anywhere in the country, it doesn't automatically come with a SAC. The SAC is generated based on the postcode you enter when registering your Sure Signal and it's created based on the nearest cell to your location.

In order for calls to be made, they must go over an MSC (Mobile Switching Centre). If the MSC doesn't hold the SAC for your area on its database, the call will fail.

The MSCs should now hold all SACs for Sure Signal calls. For anyone who is still affected please post in this thread and we can look into it further.

Thanks,

Jenny

[Andy_R]

These are exactly the symptoms of my Sure Signal problem, which has worked flawlessly for the past 2 months (after a slow start...) but since yesterday morning has suddenly started  dropping outgoing calls. I sent an email using the template at the top of this thread yesterday, but so far have had no response - not even any acknowledgement that my email has been received.

Can anyone from Vodafone team who keeps an eye this sort of thing please let me know when / if this is likely to be fixed?

I appreciate that other people have been waiting much longer, but this is quite important to me and it's been worth it's weight in gold since I've had it, so I'm not sitting here waiting weeks for just a response and what seems to be a relatively simple fix.

Thanks.

[droo]

Well I did as it stated 3 weeks ago - sure signal still does not work, no one has bothered to contact me - not happy.

[Retired-Woody]

Hi droo,

I'm sorry to hear of the issues you are having with your Sure Signal.

Where did you contact us? I have had a look and I can't find any emails from your address or posts in regards to this? If you can let me know, then we will investigate this for you.

Woody

eForum Team

[aderb]

Hi,

I can confirm the workaround that someone mentioned in this forum worked for me also. :smileyvery-happy:

I logged into My Account, and clicked on the links to Manage Sure Signal.  Then changed my postcode for the registered Sure Signal to something different, then changed it back again.

Immediately after doing this, outgoing calls started working again fine.

Ade

[aderb]

Hmmm - not so hasty.  Outgoing calls started failing again.

This time I changed the last digit of my postcode from an F to a G which represents the next road down, and outgoing calls succeed again.  I'm going to leave it like this now to see if this continues to work.

Ade

[aderb]

It seems changing your postcode to something else nearby is a valid temporary solution as it has been working for me for a while so if you are still having problems try this.  Your VSS will reboot once a new postcode is entered, so your mobile will hop back onto a macro cell before returning back to VSS a few minutes later - this is when you can validate whether this new postcode works or not.

[psychopomp1]

Hi

I got my Sure Signal unit (latest version) last week and i'm using an iPhone 4 with this. Problem is around 1 in 3 outbound calls fail; i get the message "call failed" though when i redial the number immediately, the call is connected. I've already reset the unit and also my router (Billion 7800N) but to no avail. I also believe my unit is already using the latest fimrware. The serial number is 40111113003. I've also registered my device to a different postcode in my town but again this hasn't worked. Any idea what the problem could be?

Thanks

[Retired-BenJ]

Hi psychopomp1

I can confirm this isn’t a SAC issue if 1/3 are working. A SAC issue would mean every single call would fail.

We are currently looking into this issue, could you confirm the model of your iPhone4? 16GB, 32GB etc.

Thanks
BenJ
eForum Team 

[psychopomp1]

Hi BenJ

Thanks, i got your email as well. I'm using an iphone 4 16gb running iOS 4.3.3. My broadband speed is 17 meg so that's plenty of bandwidth for the Sure Signal to operate. 

This is the tracert result:

C:\>tracert 212.183.133.177

Tracing route to host212-183-133-177.uk.access.vodafone.net [212.183.133.177]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1    77 ms     1 ms     1 ms  home.gateway.home.gateway [192.168.1.254]
  2     9 ms     9 ms     9 ms  host-62-24-255-82.as13285.net [62.24.255.82]
  3    17 ms    18 ms    17 ms  host-78-151-225-113.static.as13285.net [78.151.225.113]
  4    17 ms    17 ms    18 ms  host-78-151-225-116.static.as13285.net [78.151.225.116]
  5    24 ms    24 ms    80 ms  xe-11-1-0-rt001.sov.as13285.net [62.24.240.14]
  6    23 ms    23 ms    23 ms  xe-10-2-0-scr001.sov.as13285.net [78.144.1.128]
  7    24 ms    23 ms    24 ms  abovenet.killercreation.co.uk [79.141.38.129]
  8    23 ms    23 ms    23 ms  above-gblx.lhr3.uk.above.net [64.125.12.154]
  9    33 ms    33 ms    33 ms  VODAFONE-LTD.TenGigabitEthernet7-1.ar6.LON3.gblx.net [64.214.144.122]

When a call fails, the "call in progress" light on the SS doesn't come on immediately, it comes on 1-2 sec after the call fails so it could be some transmission delay between the 3G radio on my iphone 4 and the SS. One possible cause could be the wifi radio on my iphone 4 is interfering with the 3G radio on the iphone so i've switched the wifi off on the iphone 4. I'll report back my findings  

[psychopomp1]

Hi BenJ

I'm afraid i still get failed outbound calls even when i've switched off wifi on my iphone 4 so i don't think its an issue with the iphone. Do you think the Sure Signal device could be faulty? Its only a week or so old. Please advise.

Thanks