If you are having problems of any kind, eliminate everything and test one item at a time—adding items until the problem surfaces. In other words, start by connecting a single phone to a single line jack WITHOUT using the VoicePro. Make sure all your phone lines work in both directions, incoming and dialing out.
Make Sure You Don't Have Call Waiting
Before connecting the VoicePro, check to be sure you don't have call waiting. Have someone call your number while you are talking to another person on that line.
Do this test on each line. If you hear the call waiting tone, then the VoicePro will not be able to answer that caller. You will need to tell your phone company to disable call waiting. The proper way to accept multiple callers with the VoicePro is by using rollover to the next line.
Is Your Rollover Functioning Properly?
Test the rollover by making the first line busy and dial that number. You should ring in on the second line.
Then make both the first two lines busy. If you only have two lines, you should now get a busy signal when you dial in. If you get voice mail, then the phone company is sending the second line to voice mail. See the next section below about voice mail.
If you have more than two lines and using the larger VoicePro VP412, then continue testing additional lines. Test each additional line to be sure it rolls over to the next higher line if the prior line is busy.
If any of your lines do not roll over, then the VoicePro will not be able to answer that next caller. You'll need to tell your phone company to enable rollover.
The last line should not roll over. Any additional caller beyond your number of lines should get a busy signal. Test that by having several people call your primary number simultaneously.
Make Sure You Don't Have Phone Company Voice Mail
Check that you don't have Phone Company Voice Mail by making all your lines busy and call in. See what happens. Did you get voicemail? If you did, then that is the phone company's voice mail. You should get a busy signal.
Tell your phone company you do not want voice mail on any of your lines. You want the VoicePro's voice mail to take the messages.
Proper Line Connections
Make sure you don't have any other equipment connected to any of the lines coming from the phone company or from your VoIP adapter (if using VoIP). These lines should ONLY go to the line jacks on the Voice Pro and not split off to other phones or equipment.
Make sure you don't have more than one phone connected to any single extension jack on the VoicePro.
Test Your VoicePro
If all that works as described above, then it is time to connect your VoicePro. But start with only one line connected to the Line 1 jack on the back and only one phone connected to extension 10 on the back of the unit.
Try calling in and making a call out from extension 10. If everything works, connect the second line to Line 2 and test incoming and outgoing calls from extension 10 again.
If all that passes, then connect a second phone to extension 11 and test both incoming and dial-out from THAT phone. Also, check to call extension 10 from 11, and calling 11 from 10. Inside calling is done by pressing * then the extension.
Once you know this entirely works, start programming the VoicePro. And test every programmed function as you go along. Don't do ALL your programming and expect top test after that. If something goes wrong at this point, you won't know what program function you did that caused the trouble.
Is your telephone service via cable: Voice Over IP (VoIP)?
Cable carriers sometimes use modems with Voice Over IP (VoIP) adapters that do not follow FCC technical specs listed in 47CFR Part 68, and therefore these units do not comply with BelCore standards. That is fine for regular telephones. But it can cause trouble when interfacing with intelligent PBX switching equipment, such as the VoicePro.
Accurate functioning of a PBX such as the VoicePro is dependant on the proper use of BelCore standards specified for the PSTN (public switched telephone network).
More information is provided on our page about VoIP Compatibility Issues with Phone Systems.
VoIP Incompatibility
Incompatibility with a specific cable provider or VoIP Adapter they provide does not imply a product defect. If you have a problem using the VoicePro on a VoIP Telephony line, we will refund your purchase price 100% if returned with all components within 30 days. All we ask is that you tell us the make and model of the cable modem telephony adapter you were using.
Check this list of compatible modems to see if you have a good one.
Chirp Sound (It's Cause and Solution)
If you hear a chirp sound when calling into your office, before the recorded greeting starts, here is a solution:
The chirp sound at the beginning when the VoicePro goes off-hook answering a call is a result of a high-voltage spike from the ring voltage that overloads a protective capacitor. The capacitor quickly disperses the voltage, causing the chirp.
The problem occurs in isolated cases. Some of our customers reported suddenly having a problem when their local phone company introduced digital technology to send the calls long distances and then changing back to analog at the CO for the final leg to the customer's site.
We also found it to relate to poorly designed VoIP adapters that use a higher ring voltage.
The solution is to let the VoicePro wait until the first ring as stopped. That works because the transient voltage spike is missed and does not cause a chirp.
This can be accomplished with a simple programming change. Use Function 30 to set the rings before auto attendant to 1, not zero. That's all. The chirp is gone.
There is a side effect, however. Since you now programmed it to answer after one ring, that first ring will pass through to your extensions. The VP206 is preset, so that line 1 rings extension 10 and line 2 rings extension 11. The VP412 also continues with line 3 ringing ext 12 and line 4 ringing ext 13.
You might ask why the VoicePro does this. There are situations where one may want to have incoming calls ring to extensions before the auto-attendant answers. So they set Function 30 to a much higher ring count and either use the preset ring assignment or they assign their own with Function 4.
If you want to eliminate the single ring, you can program your VoicePro to assign all lines to ring to an unused extension. Example: Say you don't have a phone connected to ext 15. Then use Function 4 to assign CO line 1 to extension 15 and also CO line 2 to extension 15. With the VP412, you also need to assign CO lines 3 and 4 to extension 15. That solves that issue as well, and you are good to go.
Remove Phone Services You Don't Need
It's important to know what can cause a conflict. And you can save money by discontinuing these services anyway. Read on:
Why Call-Waiting Is Not Needed
You no longer need Call-Waiting on your lines if you are using the VoicePro. Instead of keeping people waiting for you to respond, you'll want to let them get through to the VoicePro and let the system handle your additional callers.
The only way to have more than one caller ring through is to have a phone line for each caller you want your phone system to handle. The proper way to manage multiple callers is to have additional phone lines with rollover.
Call-Waiting may interfere with the proper functioning of the VoicePro. For example, if someone is listening to recorded information that you provide in various menus, and another caller tries to call, the VoicePro will ignore the Call Waiting tone. That additional caller will wait forever without being connected.
Even worse, they will get a phone company voice mail, which will not function the same as the VoicePro. See "Phone Company Voice Mail" below for more on this.
The proper method is to let the VoicePro answer additional callers by allowing them to roll over to the next line. Call Waiting will prevent this from happening.
Not Needed: What Happens If You Keep Call-Waiting
If you do leave call-waiting enabled on your lines, you will hear the call waiting tone while you are talking. If you do a flash, as you usually would do to take the other caller, the VoicePro will place the present party on hold and give you dialtone on another line so you can initiate a conference call. That's not what you want to do in this case. You really want to place the first party on hold and connect to the new caller.
You are bypassing the functionality of the VoicePro by keeping Call-Waiting. You will have the problems mentioned above. It is best to use rollover and let the VoicePro handle the next caller while you continue your present conversation uninterrupted.
But if you do insist on keeping Call-Waiting, remember that the VoicePro will ignore it. However, if it happens while YOU are talking, then there is a way to override the "flash to a conference" feature. All you do is dial "52" after the flash. That sends a "flash" on the outside CO line. That was easy!
Not Needed: Phone Company Voice Mail
You can set the VoicePro to answer calls immediately and let the Auto Attendant guide your caller, or you can program it to ring to the phones first. Either way, if you can't get to a phone in time, you'll want the VoicePro to handle the process of taking messages for the proper extension or department that the caller was trying to reach.
When the VoicePro is programmed to answer immediately, the phone company voice mail will never take the calls, and you are merely wasting your money for that service.
But what if you program the VoicePro to ring through first. Now you have a problem. If you don't answer in time, will the VoicePro take the message? Or will the caller fall into the voice mail from your phone company? Sometimes they'll get the Auto Attendant. And sometimes they'll just hear your phone company message and not be able to do anything but leave a message.
It's best to let all callers ring to the VoicePro, so every caller is handled the same way. No confusion. No need to check for messages in two places. And every caller will have the flexibility of the Auto Attendant to guide their call when you are not available. If phone company voice mail answers first, the VoicePro has no chance to handle the caller.
And when you let the VoicePro take all messages, it can notify you with a message light, stutter dial tone, and even by calling your cell phone or home phone with live message alert. You have all those features built into the VoicePro ready to serve you. So get rid of phone company voice mail on all the lines that are connected to the VoicePro and reduce your phone bill.
