Upggrade to fibre broadband has caused loss of my landline phones and Vodafone does nothing to help

[ojos]

I have had Vodafone broadband for several years. This included a contract for my landline phones which I have many around the house connected to phone sockets in different rooms. It was all working 100% fine until the fibre upgrade.

When I spoke to Vodafone support a few months ago about my interest in upgrading to fibre they said that, by default, landline phones would then needed to be connected directly to the router. I explained that my phone plugs around the house had been installed by BT and when I joined Vodafone broadband engineers it took them several days to check and re-cable my landline sockets to ensure they all continued to work. Vodafone said that yes, they were aware that some customers needed to continue to use all landline phone sockets. This could be solved by fitting an adaptor to the router. They said a note was made against my account to ensure this will happen upon my upgrade to fibre.

My broadband upgrade was booked for the end of May. A week before the upgrade I called Vodafone and reminded them of my need to continue use of my landline sockets. They did some checks and said, while by default, my home sockets would not continue to work, the engineers could install an upgrade with appropriate additional work and this would ensure the fix. They sent a note to Openreach to say that appropriate installation had to be done to ensure my landline sockets continued to work.

Upon arrival of Openreach on the upgrade day I spoke to the engineers who stated that the upgrade would be done to ensure my landline phones continued to work. When the engineers left, the fibre was not yet working although all my landline sockets continued to work satisfactorily. It took about 24 hours for the fibre broadband to start working, but conversely my landline then totally ceased to work. I contacted Vodafone who assured me it could take a further couple of days for my landline to be fully initialised. However, it's now been about a fortnight and I've lost my landline for which I am paying Vodafone. Vodafone has come up with all kinds of dubious excuses but the bottom line is "tough luck, to use your landline you have to plug a phone directly into the router". They've shown not the slightest interest in explaining why they promised the necessary work would be done for my phone sockets to continue working. I've raised formal complaints but Vodafone just continue to sit on their backsides and do nothing. I'm now stuck paying for a landline which has just a single phone plugged into it which is pretty much useless to me.

[Jayach]

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@ojos wrote:
Please show me where your suggestion of connecting router TEL output directly to all original BT sockets is documented.

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On this thread it was by giving you a link to a Google search for VRI, which I'm sure is what your ex-BT engineer has done.

voice re-injection installation - Google Search

Previously I described it here:

 Solved: Re: Digital voice adapters compatible with Vodafon... - Community home (vodafone.co.uk)

But I thought a search would be better in this case.

[ojos]

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@Jayach wrote:

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@ojos wrote:
Please show me where your suggestion of connecting router TEL output directly to all original BT sockets is documented.

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On this thread it was by giving you a link to a Google search for VRI, which I'm sure is what your ex-BT engineer has done.

voice re-injection installation - Google Search

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No, the ex BT engineer mentioned nothing whatever about VRI and, until just now when I read your comment, I had never heard the term VRI. I see no point in never following your VRI link as the problem has been solved by the ATA. The engineer only ever mentioned the need to fit an ATA as the only solution to sorting my problem of connecting my landline phones. He fitted the ATA and it has worked perfectly ever since in connecting all my plugged-in landline phones.

[Cynric]

@ojos  Which router are you using and would it be possible to share a picture of the ATA you have been given please?

[ojos]

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@Cynric wrote:

@ojos  Which router are you using and would it be possible to share a picture of the ATA you have been given please?

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My router model is THG3000 which is a number of years old. When Vodafone arranged to upgrade me to fibre they said they would upgrade my router to a more modern model. However, it did not happen.
I currently don't have a picture of my ATA and it's a little difficult to photograph because of its location which will be a struggle. But I will try i the next few days. Meanwhile, others here have suggested Grandstream have an ATA. Is that correct? If so I'd like to see a picture of that ATA if you could share a picture of it so I can compare.

[Ripshod]

Clearly your Openreach engineer was working on false advice, whilst giving you bad advice. 

A seperate atsa is not required, there's one built into the vf router.

Your service us now working? Great.

@Jayach no point arguing this one, they're not interested in the truth. Their response to this post, from a subcontractor working with openreach will likely show their disinterest. No point shouting at a wall. 

[Jayach]

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@Ripshod wrote:

@Jayach no point arguing this one, they're not interested in the truth. Their response to this post, from a subcontractor working with openreach will likely show their disinterest. No point shouting at a wall. 

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True, however someone may come across this thread in the future, and I want to make sure they get the truth.

I'm also genuinely interested in just what the ex-BT engineer has done, could he have used an ATA and somehow got it to work with the Vodafone service? If so I'm sure we would all like to know how.

@ojos  If possible could you show us some pictures of the installation/ATA as @Cynric asks, or at least let us know what port on the router has been used for the connection, LAN or TEL?

[Ripshod]

You raise a great point. 

I'd be interested too. Perhaps a few photos to show what has actually been done. Due to the built-in ATA an external one won't work. Perhaps just one of those adapters we like from rhino cables (amazon)

Unlike you though I'll not be up until daft o'clock to find out lol

[Cynric]

I am asking for photos etc so we might be able to add it to the growing library of knowledge. If this is another way to get traditional phones to work with the THG3000 router it would be of great interest to many VF customers.

[Jayach]

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@Ripshod wrote:

Perhaps just one of those adapters we like from rhino cables (amazon)

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I'm pretty sure that is what it will be. Vodafone call them VoIP adapters, and they are nothing of the sort.

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[ojos]

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@Ripshod wrote:

Clearly your Openreach engineer was working on false advice, whilst giving you bad advice. 

A seperate atsa is not required, there's one built into the vf router.

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Where did I say the engineer was from Openreach?  I clearly stated that he engineer who fitted my ATA was an ex employee of BT and extremely experienced (more than 30 years I believe with them, installing and maintaining landline phones).

You also appear not to have bothered to fully read the information I provided. I have previously clearly explained that senior Vodafone technical staff informed me about a year ago (well before the fibre upgrade) that in order for me to be able to continue using my plugged in landline phones I needed to obtain an ATA which they said would be provided to me a part of the upgrade. Regrettably this did not happen because, after the upgrade, my plugged in landline phones totally ceased to work. The Vodafone complaints team then stated quite categorically that there is no way my existing plugged in landline phones could continue to work in situ after fibre installation.

I confirm what I said before: that the very experienced BT engineer who fixed the problem did exactly what the senior Vodafone technical staff told me a year ago. viz in order to continue to use my many landline phones plugged in around the house I would need to have an appropriate external ATA installed. The ATA provided and installed by the experienced ex BT engineer has worked perfectly, now enabling me to continue to use all my existing landline phones exactly as before, This is despite the Vodafone complaints team telling me after the fibre upgrade there was no way to make it ever happen. Since I recently informed Vodafone complaints team of the true situation ie the successful installation of my ATA by an experienced engineer, they have now compensated me for the cost I incurred to fix the problem.