Can't Receive Calls From Petrolia

[GuitarMan]

We can't seem to receive calls from Petrolia, Ontario. The numbers that are trying to call us are 519-882-XXXX and 226-738-XXXX. On Saturday, October 20, the 226 # tried to call us at 6:20 PM. The caller reported that it went straight to voicemail. The caller ID did not show up with anything. The online log showed nothing and the voicemail did not receive anything. 6 other attempts occurred from 7:10-7:20 PM of the same day. Then on Sunday, October 21, the 519 # called at 11:10 am and the same thing. These 2 numbers are from Petrolia, Ontario and they are family. All other calls from anybody else, works fine.

[TheHardy]

If the calls are completing (going to voicemail) then the call is being transported correctly. If the calls were to fail and receive a recorded announcement that they cannot be completed, that is a different matter. Are you sure that the callers were indeed getting VOICEMAIL and not a recording stating that they cannot complete the call??

It has not been uncommon in the past for OTHER TELCO providers to NOT have added Fibernetics exchanges (NPA-NXXs) in a timely fashion to THEIR rates and routing tables, thereby rendering the Fongo numbers UNDIALABLE.

As you are not showing any calls in your logs nor any active voicemails, I have a sneaking suspicion that THIS is what is actually occuring!

Is there any chance that you can have the callers from those numbers VERIFY this action by placing the calls to you again??

Also: can you please let us know what the first 6 digits of your FONGO # are? I wonder if it is a recent one? Are the people/family from Petrolia (519-882 defaults to Bell Cda, 226-738 to Telus Int -- although either or both could have been ported to another carrier!) using WHICH carrier? Bell and Telus Integrated as indicated, or do you know who their telco provider is? As I say, some do not add new npa-nxxs very quickly.

Again, as the logs do not show the missed calls (if they hit your voicemail, they WOULD show in the logs!!), I am wondering if the calls are indeed completing correctly!

[TheHardy]

I should state that Fongo does not block incoming calls from any particular carrier. I can verify that I have received INTERNATIONAL calls on my FPL softphone from Europe and other locations throughout North America without problem, except as indicated when my 778-300-x number was a "new" addition, and some telcos did not recognize it as a valid number.

[GuitarMan]

Our first 6 digits are 519-397-XXXX. We did port our number over to Freephoneline. The callers that cannot reach us are from Petroilia and are both Cogeco customer. Will double check again what message the callers are getting when they try to call us.

[TheHardy]

Our first 6 digits are 519-397-XXXX. We did port our number over to Freephoneline. The callers that cannot reach us are from Petroilia and are both Cogeco customer. Will double check again what message the callers are getting when they try to call us.

As a ported number it should not be too much of a problem in terms of the number being in the database -- that unique little problem seems to be with Fibernetics-native numbers.

I am going to assume that they were able to call you correctly before you ported to FPL ... is it a recent port, or has it been a while now?

If it is relatively recent, a call to Customer Support or a PM to Steve/Mike would be the way to go, to make sure that there was nothing potentially messed up during the porting procedure -- there have been a few cases in the past of ported numbers having minor snags.

[GuitarMan]

Yes. When we were with Cogeco, we would receive the calls from them with no issue. They are with Cogeco then and now. As for porting our number, it was sometime in August of this year. By the way, you mentioned

PM to Steve/Mike would be the way to go

. This is probably a stupid question, but "Who is Steve/Mike and how do I PM them."

[TheHardy]

The only stupid question is one that you do not ask.

August is a long time for the port not to have worked properly, but stranger things have happened. It might be unrelated, but there were some issues back around that time frame.

Steve & Mike are the two Fongo employees who do most of the heavy lifting around here in the forums. Usually if you click (from the forum index) RECENT POSTS, you will see their names in a GREEN FONT ... alternately, search thru any of the announcement threads for them.

When you find one of their posts, click on the PM button in their right-screen mini-profile to send them a private message. Include the relevant information (and or a link to this thread) and ask them to investigate for you.

[TheHardy]

Unless your ATA has some settings where you have blocked or blacklisted the numbers, this is odd behavior. I did a quick search of the forums and could not find anything of this ilk before, the exception being when new Fibernetics-exchanges were not programmed into foreign switches correctly (ie new numbers not recognized). As yours is a port, this is not the case. And short of a blacklist situation, there is nothing network-side that SHOULD be blocking incoming calls from specific areas.

If the calls are transitioning properly from Cogeco (their side) over the network to your end (FPL) it should be showing up in the call logs somehow.

As I say, with dates/times/specifics, further investigation at the Fongo-side of things can be initiated by Steve/Mike/someone else. Short of that, I am at a loss.

I am assuming that you can receive OTHER calls just fine, just the ones from Petrolia are an issue? You stated this ...


When checking your call logs, just scroll down to the bottom was well, to make sure that failed calls are not at the very bottom -- there have been issues with the manner in which FPL call logs are sorted/presented, as they seem to be broken down into categories as well as date/time.

[GuitarMan]

Currently, I am using a Grandstream 286. There is nothing in the settings (that I can see) that can blacklist these numbers.

Receiving other calls are completely fine. I actually got the callers from Petrolia to call another Freephoneline number (one that was not ported) and it went through fine (voicemail picked it up).

From this, I am assuming that it had to do with the porting process and that there was something that was not completed.

So far,this is what I have gathered :

* Calls from Cogeco callers to us (Freephoneline) - DOES NOT go through
* Calls from Other Telco callers to us (Freephoneline) - DOES go through

I will PM Steve/Mike on this issue. I do not know where to begin. Is it a Freephoneline issue with the porting or is it Cogeco that is not connecting their customers call to us/Freephoneline properly.

[GuitarMan]

We are trying to arrange someone locally that is with Cogeco to call us to see if the calls go through. If it does not go through, we can figure that it is somehow connected to the port process or that it is on Cogeco's end.

[TheHardy]

hey GuitarMan -- good job on the troubleshooting so far for isolating what works and what does not work.

Seeing as it is a ported number, Cogeco should not have any issue in handling it, as until the final leg into your home it appears as a different carrier. Why only certain users in a certain area are affected is very odd.

Getting started in reporting it is as simple as a PM to Steve or Mike, with a link to this thread. You can summarize your tests and the effects, but the troubleshooting you have done so far should help them immensely in tracking down where the problem may lie.

I for one would be interested to find out where the issue lay when it is solved.

Are there any log entries for the failing calls anywhere? Check near the bottom of the call log, as unsuccessful calls sometimes get sorted down there, rather than at the top.

If the calls are NOT reaching FPL at all, then likely the callers from Petrolia would have to initiate a trouble ticket on their end, as it would be a routing problem there.

Even though the port process has been greatly simplified and should be foolproof by now, as you know -- any time you have humans involved, there is a chance for things to be fouled up. Some carriers porting procedures make you wonder if there is a Grand Oz behind the curtain somewhere pulling levers on each call ...

[GuitarMan]

So far ...

Contact Fongo_Steve and he checked call logs and see no number that was given to him. We called Cogeco and they blame Freephoneline for this issue. The funny part about this is that local (within our city) people who are with Cogeco can call us, just not people from Petrolia. People from Petrolia gets a voicemail. The voicemail is confirmed that it is our old voicemamil from Cogeco. How weird is this? Any suggestion. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE.

[Jake]

That looks pretty obvious to me, which is the porting process has not gone completely to plan and your number is still stuck in part of Petrolia Cogeco's system.

I assume Cogeco used to be your phone company as you say the calls are going to your old voicemail. You need to keep banging on at them.

There isn't any settings any of us can tell you to change as it won't effect this. The only thing Fongo can do is get their Porting department to contact Cogeco, but I don't know if they can do that - it's just way beyond what I know. Something has gone wrong with your port, and I think you need to keep pushing Cogeco to fix it. The calls are not leaving the Petrolia area by the sounds of it, and certainly not hitting the Fongo system.

Maybe someone else can suggest a route for you to take, but I would just keep calling Cogeco and ask them to look into the call routing for that number in the Petrolia exchange.

[FONGO_mike]

That looks pretty obvious to me, which is the porting process has not gone completely to plan and your number is still stuck in part of Petrolia Cogeco's system.

I assume Cogeco used to be your phone company as you say the calls are going to your old voicemail. You need to keep banging on at them.

There isn't any settings any of us can tell you to change as it won't effect this. The only thing Fongo can do is get their Porting department to contact Cogeco, but I don't know if they can do that - it's just way beyond what I know. Something has gone wrong with your port, and I think you need to keep pushing Cogeco to fix it. The calls are not leaving the Petrolia area by the sounds of it, and certainly not hitting the Fongo system.

Maybe someone else can suggest a route for you to take, but I would just keep calling Cogeco and ask them to look into the call routing for that number in the Petrolia exchange.

If it were all cogeco numbers getting your old voice mail, it may have been something on our end. As this is strictly from one area though, it should seems to indicate an issue with Cogeco service.

[GuitarMan]

Has this ever happened before?

[FONGO_mike]

I can not think of any cases off the top of my head of anyone from that area having issues trying to reach one of our numbers.

[Jake]

Has this ever happened before?

I don't recall anyone mentioning calls not going through in an specific area before. There has been cases where calls outside Fongo have not got through, but Fongo numbers could; or calls from a specific phone company or carrier. But never just from one area of a certain phone company.

It just seems that they have forgotten to 'unplug' your number from their system completely, so calls to that number that are made local to that exchange just stay within the exchange because that is where it believes the number should be. Maybe the problem is your account did not get shut down properly when you left Cogeco so the 'system' keeps routing the calls to your old voicemail.

[GuitarMan]

I guess what I was getting at is ... when the permission has been given to Freephoneline to port the number over to their service, who is responsible for the COMPLETE porting process. I'm not blaming anyone, but it is frustrating. This forum has been great in guiding me, but in the future, who would be responsible for the COMPLETION of the port? I'm hoping this issue will get resolve soon. A ticket has been initialize with Cogeco to see how the numbers are being routed within the Petrolia area. Crossing my fingers that this resolves it ... wife is on my case day and night

[TheHardy]

In a perfect world, the porting procedure is the responsibility of the RECEIVING carrier (in your case FPL). They put in the request to your DONATING (old-Cogeco) carrier. Now, as bound by Canadian Telcom regs (I don't have time to look up and quote) the DONATING carrier is responsible to undertake the porting process in a timely and professional manner, and notify the RECEIVING carrier when that has been done on their end. The RECEIVING carrier then verifies this and moves along notifying you and assuming all is well.

There are a LOT of moving parts involved in a port process, even though it sounds simple. And any small one of them going wrong can end up like yours did.

You have done a REMARKABLE job in troubleshooting, and the information that the certain callers from a certain ratecentre and a certain carrier in that ratecentre ONLY receive your OLD voicemail is HUGELY beneficial in tracking this down.

Now, the reason that the RECEIVING carrier is responsible, is because they are the ones that you are now paying money (or in FPL's case, NOT) to and they are the ones providing your service. Thru the porting agreement, it is your RECEIVING carrier that has to follow up with your DONATING carrier.

While the problem seems to be on the routing-end of things with Cogeco in terms of where they are sending the calls to, it is FPL in this case that needs to do the heavy lifting.

End of the day, FPL needs to get in touch with Cogeco (your old carrier) and make sure the port was done properly -- almost going back to step one and starting again (except we know that is not really possible) -- but each step will need to be done and verified. Almost ends up putting a "trap" on the line and seeing exactly how all calls are handled to see where the problem is and then fixing it. <sigh>

I feel your pain in this, and sincerely wish that there was something more I could do to assist you!

[FONGO_mike]

In a perfect world, the porting procedure is the responsibility of the RECEIVING carrier (in your case FPL). They put in the request to your DONATING (old-Cogeco) carrier. Now, as bound by Canadian Telcom regs (I don't have time to look up and quote) the DONATING carrier is responsible to undertake the porting process in a timely and professional manner, and notify the RECEIVING carrier when that has been done on their end. The RECEIVING carrier then verifies this and moves along notifying you and assuming all is well.

There are a LOT of moving parts involved in a port process, even though it sounds simple. And any small one of them going wrong can end up like yours did.

You have done a REMARKABLE job in troubleshooting, and the information that the certain callers from a certain ratecentre and a certain carrier in that ratecentre ONLY receive your OLD voicemail is HUGELY beneficial in tracking this down.

Now, the reason that the RECEIVING carrier is responsible, is because they are the ones that you are now paying money (or in FPL's case, NOT) to and they are the ones providing your service. Thru the porting agreement, it is your RECEIVING carrier that has to follow up with your DONATING carrier.

While the problem seems to be on the routing-end of things with Cogeco in terms of where they are sending the calls to, it is FPL in this case that needs to do the heavy lifting.

End of the day, FPL needs to get in touch with Cogeco (your old carrier) and make sure the port was done properly -- almost going back to step one and starting again (except we know that is not really possible) -- but each step will need to be done and verified. Almost ends up putting a "trap" on the line and seeing exactly how all calls are handled to see where the problem is and then fixing it. <sigh>

I feel your pain in this, and sincerely wish that there was something more I could do to assist you!

Once the number is taken by the receiving carrier, the originating provider needs to remove the number from their system. As it is a digital line that Shaw offers, they need to remove it in order to stop routing calls.

[TheHardy]

Once the number is taken by the receiving carrier, the originating provider needs to remove the number from their system. As it is a digital line that Shaw offers, they need to remove it in order to stop routing calls.

Yes, that is correct --- however, as the end user is now NO LONGER a Shaw customer, they can no longer make the request to Shaw, as their account would be invalid -- the receiving carrier who is now the customer service contact for the customer (and was the "Customer" of Shaw, so to speak, for the number pull) needs to contact the DONATING carrier to get the situation rectified.

Repeated botched ports by a certain carrier should be reported, both by the end-user customer and the porting-IN company to the CRTC to enforce compliance with the LNP regulations.

[FONGO_mike]

Once the number is taken by the receiving carrier, the originating provider needs to remove the number from their system. As it is a digital line that Shaw offers, they need to remove it in order to stop routing calls.

Yes, that is correct --- however, as the end user is now NO LONGER a Shaw customer, they can no longer make the request to Shaw, as their account would be invalid -- the receiving carrier who is now the customer service contact for the customer (and was the "Customer" of Shaw, so to speak, for the number pull) needs to contact the DONATING carrier to get the situation rectified.

Repeated botched ports by a certain carrier should be reported, both by the end-user customer and the porting-IN company to the CRTC to enforce compliance with the LNP regulations.

If people calling that number still reach your previous provider, then it is indeed you that would need to contact them as they are still routing calls to your former service with them.
As the account was not in our name, we are not permitted to contact them in regards to the service you were receiving.

[TheHardy]

If people calling that number still reach your previous provider, then it is indeed you that would need to contact them as they are still routing calls to your former service with them.
As the account was not in our name, we are not permitted to contact them in regards to the service you were receiving.

This is *INCORRECT* Mike ... once the port has started, and the "new" carrier puts in in the request, the port process is undergoing. Once it has been completed, the "old" carrier no longer recognizes the former "user" of that number as having any access to that account, as it has now been passed from old-to-new. I went thru a similar issue for a friend when they went from Telus->Eastlink ... answered calls worked fine, but calls during a BUSY condition went to the OLD Telus voicemail instead of Eastlink ... calls to Eastlink resulted in "it ain't our problem". Calls to Telus resulted in "you ported out of our service, we are no longer your provider". Resolution was reached upon FINALLY convincing the Eastlink customer service dept to go back and literally "Step by step" the port process again to ensure that each stage of it was done correctly; turns out that it had NOT been ... the system at the Telus end was "open" and had not been connected by Eastlink, in this case, and Eastlink was indeed at fault; Telus however did NOTHING to ensure that the port OUT was successful, and indeed was causing a burden on their system as failed calls were remaining on their switch rather than terminating to Eastlink ...

Remember, I know a little bit about this; as I say, contacting the old provider for the NUMBER-holder is pointless, as they no longer control that number -- it has, on the old providers side, been ported/transferred to the new carrier. Requests to verify the port status can be made by the new carrier back to the old provider via the same back-office channels that the initial port is processed thru, the same as having to resubmit one with bunk information or an addendum. Sorry if I don't have all the technical terms down, but I know the workings of it, having been down this road once or twice.

[FONGO_mike]

If people calling that number still reach your previous provider, then it is indeed you that would need to contact them as they are still routing calls to your former service with them.
As the account was not in our name, we are not permitted to contact them in regards to the service you were receiving.

This is *INCORRECT* Mike ... once the port has started, and the "new" carrier puts in in the request, the port process is undergoing. Once it has been completed, the "old" carrier no longer recognizes the former "user" of that number as having any access to that account, as it has now been passed from old-to-new. I went thru a similar issue for a friend when they went from Telus->Eastlink ... answered calls worked fine, but calls during a BUSY condition went to the OLD Telus voicemail instead of Eastlink ... calls to Eastlink resulted in "it ain't our problem". Calls to Telus resulted in "you ported out of our service, we are no longer your provider". Resolution was reached upon FINALLY convincing the Eastlink customer service dept to go back and literally "Step by step" the port process again to ensure that each stage of it was done correctly; turns out that it had NOT been ... the system at the Telus end was "open" and had not been connected by Eastlink, in this case, and Eastlink was indeed at fault; Telus however did NOTHING to ensure that the port OUT was successful, and indeed was causing a burden on their system as failed calls were remaining on their switch rather than terminating to Eastlink ...

Remember, I know a little bit about this; as I say, contacting the old provider for the NUMBER-holder is pointless, as they no longer control that number -- it has, on the old providers side, been ported/transferred to the new carrier. Requests to verify the port status can be made by the new carrier back to the old provider via the same back-office channels that the initial port is processed thru, the same as having to resubmit one with bunk information or an addendum. Sorry if I don't have all the technical terms down, but I know the workings of it, having been down this road once or twice.

Please keep in mind, once a number is ported out to another company, the original provider is supposed to remove all information (including the number) from it's own system. As an example, if someone were to port out of Fongo, and Fongo did not remove the information from it's network, then all Fongo users attempting to call the number, would be routed to the VM we provide. This would not be the fault of the new provider, but from us for not removing it. Now, that being said, it is not always the case although it is from what i have seen the most common issue.
When you dial out form your phone, your provider decides how to route the call. So if the number shows up in their own network, they will always pass it through their own system first (lower costs, don't pay themself a termination fee, etc, etc) This is where no longer recognizing the user could be an issue.

[TheHardy]

Please keep in mind, once a number is ported out to another company, the original provider is supposed to remove all information (including the number) from it's own system. As an example, if someone were to port out of Fongo, and Fongo did not remove the information from it's network, then all Fongo users attempting to call the number, would be routed to the VM we provide. This would not be the fault of the new provider, but from us for not removing it. Now, that being said, it is not always the case although it is from what i have seen the most common issue.
When you dial out form your phone, your provider decides how to route the call. So if the number shows up in their own network, they will always pass it through their own system first (lower costs, don't pay themself a termination fee, etc, etc) This is where no longer recognizing the user could be an issue.

You are correct in this breakdown. SUPPOSED to remove all the information is the key -- and I believe that is where the fault lies in this specific case. As I state though, as Cogeco is NO LONGER the provider of record for the DIALED number, they will not recognize the poster as a valid customer/account NOR process his request to check the line (at least they probably won't, I am not sure if he has tried -- it has been my experience though, that they do say, as I stated "you are not our customer!"). Therefore, the ONLY recourse is thru the current provider (even though the issue is NOT directly with the current provider, as we both acknowledge!). The onus then is on the current carrier to contact the former carrier to get them to check the "call-path".

You know, the whole rates and routing thing gets quite confusing for the average lay-man, and end-to-end termination is indeed a tricky thing to understand unless you know some of the "under-the-hood" workings. I think that between the two of us, we have described it well, and may be at cross-purposes due to misunderstanding --- I agree with your analysis above, it is just I am stating that due to who the number-owner/main service provider is NOW, that where the customer can turn to for support is LIMITED --- even though it is not a FPL issue (directly), because FPL is now the provider, THEY must contact Cogeco (former holder of the #) to beat them into submission to fix the incorrect head-end routing issue (which seems to be retaining the call internally rather than routing outbound/ported correctly.... --- IE a botched port, or a bad rates/routing table!).