sundance-communications.com/forum Forums TDM Business Telephone Systems Avaya - Lucent Telephones & Systems AT&T SPIRIT LONG DISTANCE PROBS-Will Pay For Help

My law office has 10 AT&T spirit 24 button phones. When I bought the building they were already here and installed. I have all of the manuals, etc. but cannot figure out the following problem:

The Local Service Provider is SBC (now powered by AT&T, whatever that means). The long distance provider WAS AT&T. When I switched the phones into my name I canceled AT&T long distance and switched to SBC unlimited long distance (in-state and state-to-state).

However, after switching to SBC long distance I still received bills from AT&T. First the AT&T charges were simply listed on the SBC bill (which was different from before I canceled AT&T long distance). The next month however, after I notified SBC and AT&T of the problem, the AT&T charges were once again invoiced directly from AT&T. This whole time I was paying for unlimited long distance with SBC on all four lines.

Then SBC tells me that I am on a "do not treat" list and so not to worry, that they will figure it out, and fix it. Meanwhile AT&T is sending collection notices etc. for their bills. Finally, AT&T threatens to shut off my long distance (that is supposedly through SBC). SBC advises that AT&T cannot and will not modify the SBC long distance. However, AT&T did cut off the long distance. The following may help explain how.

The SBC tech determined the problem is in my phone system, that the phone system is programmed to automatically dial a "10 10" number, which must be a 1010-AT&T number (i.e. an AT&T LD access code).

I need to erase or unprogram any long distance access codes. I don't dial "9" or anything else for an outside line and so don't believe I am on a Centrex system. I don't see any reference in any of the manuals I have as to how to program long distance access codes. Please Help. I will gladly donate to a PayPal account out there if somebody can walk me through the solution.

NOTE: I discovered a year ago that I also could not dial 877 or 866 phone numbers. Since then I discovered the craziest work around for those numbers. By dialing *67 I can dial 877 or 866 numbers. And you guessed it by dialing *67 I can dial long distance (presumably through SBC.)

I don't think it has anything to do with your phone system. Do you know, actually would you know where to look to see if there are any old "long distance dialers" on the CO lines going into your system?

-Hal

I don't believe Sprit systems can even do something like that. So what you are saying is that you simply press a line button and dial the long distance call, correct? No dialing 9, pressing extra buttons, speed dials or anything like that?

A good place to start is to pick up on each of your lines and dial 1-700-555-4141. This will give you a welcome greeting from the carrier you are "supposed" to have for long distance service.

Unfortunately, with SBC and ATT being married now, who knows what you will hear?

The *67 thing leads me to believe that your system has some level of toll restriction programmed. This restriction doesn't know how to handle these calls, so it lets them go. All that *67 does is block your number from showing up on the recipient's display, but it's apparently enough to trick the system into letting the call go out to 866 and 877 numbers.

Since we don't know which particular Spirit system you have (308, 616, 2448, etc.) it's kind of hard to offer much more than to speculate at this point. Go to the system's main control unit and get some model numbers or at least a good physical description and we will try to get to the bottom of this.

She spirit cannot add 1010*** to outgoing calls

maybe he has some old SMART1 dialers on the lines - so old that it thinks 888 and 877 should be long distance so it is trying to force the toll free calls over the long distance carrier and the long distance carrier is not passing the call.

Another dialer brand is teltronics, these devices were widely used in the era of long distance when it was provided by some one other than the local carrier. An easy fix is to locate the dialers ( with either the mitel or teltronics name on them, unplug them (power )then do your 1-700-555-4141 ( or just dial 0 )test and see if the it results in reaching your chosen carrier. Also if this is successful contact a qualified service tech in your area to remove the old rj45 jacks with shorting pins from your co conection as these allways seem to fail as they age.and may i ask you a question? A realter friend of mine just got into a conversation about paying someone a $1000 for a quit claim deed on there home just before they lose it to the bank. He claims that if the house sells for mopre than the morgage the diffrence is paid to the quit claim deed holder but we both argued who would be on the hook if it was sold for less than owed.

Hi all, and may I say WOW! I could not have imagined that so many kind people would have chimed in with answers/thoughts so quickly. Thank you all.

I do think there is an extra "dialer" or something. It has four lines in and four out. It is not an AT&T component. It has a button on the end that toggles between "standby", "auto" and "something else that I can't remember right now from home".

The system is a 2448. I will check in the a.m. as to the name on what I think may be a dialer. It is connected to the AT&T control unit with the removable cards. This particular control unit has 4 or 5 cards in it and has 2 or 3 empty slots. Hopefully this added info causes some light bulbs to go off. I will update the other component info in the morning.

thanks

Joey

Joey
Unless your super handy and can do the wiring
yourself, you may need an installer in Indiana to come out and run your telephone lines around the device you have.

It's pretty safe to assume that you do have an external dialer. If it's installed correctly, you should be able to unplug the cords from the individual jacks that the dialer is plugged into. If they are the proper jacks (RJ31X), they will leave the lines connected to the Spirit system even when nothing is plugged in. Give it a try, the worst that can happen is that you will need to plug them back in and get a technician to bypass them for you.

"Thank you for being an SBC long distance customer" is the sweet message I just got when dialing the 1-700 number listed above. I did have a Manager + by Teltronics, Inc. It had four lines going into it and none coming out which perplexed me as to how to wire around it. I was hoping four in, four out, remove the dialer, add four couplers and whammo!

But instead I first just tried to unplug the four lines (RJ45s) as suggested. That didn't work as it left me without a dial tone. So I traced the four just unplugged lines back to their next connection(s) which were four jacks labeled with my four phone numbers.

I then unplugged the lines from them but there was still no dial tone. So, with the dialer lines totally removed and thus the dialer totally removed from the system, I followed the wires from those four labeled phone jacks to four more jacks.

This second set of four jacks had wires (hard-wired) going in from the back from a crazy board looking thing with a bunch of pins, then also hard wired over to the four labeled jacks that I first discovered (from which I removed the dialer lines). AND these four jacks also had four lines (RJ45) leading up to the AT&T controller.

I took a chance and unplugged the RJ45 lines leading into the jacks from the controller and plugged them into the four jacks from which I removed the dialer lines (i.e. the first four (labeled) RJ45 jacks which were one step up from dialer).

IT WORKED! I have a dial-tone, the lines roll over correctly, the fax line is still the fax line and long distance numbers and the newer 866, 877 numbers work without dialing *67, which leads me to this.

YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME. If you ever have a quick legal question, give me a call and I'll call you right back via my now-working long distance:) My website is in my profile. I cannot practice law anywhere other than Indiana and some federal courts but I may be able to point you in the right direction.

Thanks to all,

Joey

PS If anyone wants this dialer, send me your adress via email or my website. Also, if anyone is interested in seeing a photo of the wiring for further insight (or to keep me from blowing myself up, let me know).

The cords that connect the Teltronics Netmanagers have 2 pairs of wires. 1 pair connects the dialer to the Network Interface and the other pair connects the dialer to the CPE.

The dialer splits the line, collects the digits as they are dialed, decides if the call needs a 1010xxx code tacked on as a prefix and then dials out the required digits to the telephone company.

If the jacks that the dialers are connected to are in good shape, you should be able to unplug the dialer cords from the jacks and everything should be fine. The other alternative would be to power down the dialer and it would act as an oversized bridging clip.