Returning to POTS from digital phone
August 1, 2013 8:52 AM   Subscribe

Last phone service I had was Comcast voice. I discontinued it and returned the black box that was mounted in the rafters in the basement. Now I want to add an analog POTS line. I ordered it from Verizon, and they say it was activated, but when I plug an old trimline phone into one of my jacks, I get no dial tone. Was there something else I need to do to restore analog phone capability besides just unplug the black box?
posted by skidoom to Computers & Internet (10 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Check to see if your household line(s) are connected to the box outside where (hopefully) Verizon's line is also physically connected.
posted by jquinby at 8:55 AM on August 1, 2013


Have you tried ALL of your jacks. It's possible that there were multiple lines in your house, and that one or two of the jacks were wired for a different line.

Another thing is that the wiring may be terrible in your house.

A quick check is to go outside to the Entrance Bridge, If you can open it, you'll see ports for your 10-pin connector (typical telephone connector). Plug it in there. If there's dial-tone there, it's an issue with the inside wiring.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 8:59 AM on August 1, 2013 [1 favorite]


The outside line comes into a d-mark block at your house. You need to make sure it goes out from there to the rest of the house. Whatever line was connected to your Comcast box might not be the same line coming in from VZ. If it is, make sure that there is some way to connect that line in the absence of this mysterious black box to the leads to the rest of the jacks in the house. You could get a tone tester and test the line coming in that you think is the VZ line.

You could also have VZ come out and prove that the tone is live in your house. It would cost extra to have them look at the inside wiring, but they are obligated to get a working line into the house.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 9:01 AM on August 1, 2013


And in other old Bell Telephone lore, if you find a live line on one of your jacks, and you want to verify that the number you were given is the number that's working on that line, dial 200-222-2222. At BellSouth we called it the Ani-Bell number. It has a real name though.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 9:07 AM on August 1, 2013


Ruthless Bunny: "And in other old Bell Telephone lore, if you find a live line on one of your jacks, and you want to verify that the number you were given is the number that's working on that line, dial 200-222-2222. At BellSouth we called it the Ani-Bell number. It has a real name though."

While its official name is the Automatic Number Announcement Circuit (ANAC), I have heard it called the "Iron Maiden" because of the electronic sounding authoritative female voice used. Prior to digital lines, the 958 number worked almost anywhere. We used it to get the incoming call number from the payphone in the smoking room at my high school. I mention that to note that there used to be payphones out there and my high school had a designated smoking area for those over 18. Boy how times have changed.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 9:15 AM on August 1, 2013 [1 favorite]


Here's a link that says that Verizon has a habit of removing the copper land lines. Just one more way in which Verizon is evil. I use Verizon despite their evil practices.
posted by small_ruminant at 9:19 AM on August 1, 2013


Comcast will have disconnected your house from the telephone line when they set you up with VoIP. You need to reconnect your house wiring to the telephone line coming from the pole.
posted by kavasa at 9:21 AM on August 1, 2013


Verizon thinks you have a POTS line, correct? This means there's a grey box on the outside of your house somewhere, where the phone line comes down from the poles and hits the side of your house. This box is referred to by telecom people as the MPOE or NID (or, sometimes, DMARC). There are subtle differences in those terms, but...

Inside this box, there's a phone socket, and a plug on a little piece of wire. The wire on the plug goes to your house, the socket goes to the phone line. You can unplug your house and plug in a phone there. If your phone works there, then the problem is with your house wiring, if it doesn't work there then the it's Verizon's problem.

If that wire is unplugged, then that's likely what disconnected your lines from the outside wires when your Comcast box got put in, and if the phone works out there you can just plug that wire back in and everything else should work.
posted by straw at 9:27 AM on August 1, 2013 [2 favorites]


For what it's worth, if you don't have a demarc (short for demarcation) box, Verizon is required to install one on request. If you have one, straw probably has the correct answer, as that is typically how they disconnect you from the telephone company.

If that isn't it, pictures of the area where Comcast's box was would be helpful in providing further guidance.
posted by wierdo at 10:37 AM on August 1, 2013


They probably reconnected the wrong line. A lot of houses have multiple lines going in, and the engineers tend to just hook up the first one they see on the panel outside. In my case it was a useless jack in a spare bedroom behind a closet. They refused to fix it without a huge charge so I fixed it for free by switching phone companies and making sure I was around for the installation.
posted by w0mbat at 11:23 AM on August 1, 2013 [1 favorite]


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