OBiTALK Community

General Support => Day-to-Day Use => Topic started by: FromNY on March 27, 2020, 02:26:31 PM

Title: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: FromNY on March 27, 2020, 02:26:31 PM
I have OBI 202 with GV and as of 3/26/2020 we are having issue with incoming calls.
During the incoming call, we can hear phone ringing but as soon as we picking up the handset the call is disconnected. On the other side of the line, people who are calling are redirected to voicemail as if we never picked up the phone.

Any ideas how to resolve the issue.

Thank you.
Victor
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: jldeon on March 27, 2020, 03:14:31 PM
Came here to ask the exact same question - we have an Obi200, haven't touched the settings in GV or on the obitalk portal, and for the last few days at least, whenever the phone rings and we pick up, we get dialtone.  The caller continues to hear the phone ring, and then eventually goes to voicemail.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: jjtricket on March 27, 2020, 03:29:58 PM
http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=16876.0

same issue here
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: managerharry on March 27, 2020, 04:19:52 PM
This is happening to me also with my >6 month old Obi200.  Hooked up my old Obi202 and same issue.
Please fix this folks.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: FromNY on March 27, 2020, 04:52:15 PM
Just checked status of GV on G Suite Status Dashboard and it shows service disruption:
https://www.google.com/appsstatus#hl=en&v=status
Not sure if it is related to incoming calls ussue.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 27, 2020, 05:26:45 PM
a) The Google status page only reports outages on Google services that have a contractual service level; for example, the various pieces of G Suite, which customers pay to use.  The Google Voice row only reflects the G Suite version of Google Voice, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the consumer OBiTALK device status.

b) This may or may not be an actual outage.  Perversely, this stuff seems to happen on Friday afternoons, and getting anyone at Google to work on it is very difficult -- I've been there and done that on several past outages that were more severe than this, and I was able to work with their engineering staff, but given the COVID-19 situation, they are short-staffed and prioritizing keeping critical services running.

c) They will have absolutely no sympathy nor interest in the problem if it is being caused by attempted business use patterns, such as mass calling or outbound SMS to multiple customers, friends, students, etc, which will automatically block or suspend your use of the service.  I doubt this is the case here, since you are posting inbound call issues.  But, before reporting, you need to sign into the correct Gmail account that holds your Google Voice number, and go to the Google Voice inbox or settings page.  If you are re-directed to a suspension message, then your service has been shut down for abuse.  Otherwise, you're fine.   https://voice.google.com/u/0/calls (https://voice.google.com/u/0/calls)

That said, I'll report it, if you go start your own, new discussion over on the official Google Voice forum.  We'll need you to post from the same Gmail account that holds your Google Voice number, provide detailed symptoms, and give Google Voice engineering your permission to examine your account.

Here's the link:  https://support.google.com/voice/thread/new?hl=en (https://support.google.com/voice/thread/new?hl=en)

If you preface your post's title with "ATTN:  Bluescat", it'll help me find the posts.  Thanks!
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: sportflyer on March 27, 2020, 06:53:05 PM
Obi support suggested I update firmware which I just did . Problem still persists. Not sure its a GV issue or OBI issue . I will check again tomorrow .
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: QSnexus on March 28, 2020, 01:57:28 AM
Same issue here as everyone is describing with cannot answer incoming calls but outgoing works fine, when calling the Google Voice number that is connected to my OBi200 firmware 3.2.2 (Build: 5859EX) + home phone, I don't hear anything when picking up home phone and the cell phone that is calling the Google Voice number on the OBi200 eventually leaves a voice mail on GV and not on the home phone answering machine that is connected to Obi200. I have not touched any config or hw it just started out of the blue on 03/27. The reason we know this is an issue is that all of the sudden we started getting people telling us that they hear a new voice mail greeting and ask why we aren't seeing any new voice mail messages show on home answering machine.

From the forum posts it looks to be an issue on the back end at Google.  Before finding this thread I read through a bunch of other posts about troubleshooting issues with phone answering machine, specifically Panasonic phones, connected to Obihai with GV, from Google searches on posts here. I will be sure to check this thread tomorrow to find out if someone got it working. I will post on Google Voice Support page linked in Reply #5. Thanks!
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: sportflyer on March 28, 2020, 08:09:05 AM
I also have a panasonic cordless answering device. I will turn off the answerer part . I will also try with a plain old corded phone . Will advise if any of these options work.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: sportflyer on March 28, 2020, 09:41:15 AM
I replaced Panasonic Cordless phone (with answerer function )with std plain old corded phone and the problem is solved.

I then rebooted the cordless phone and turned off the answerer function ...this also works.  Finally I turned on the answerer function and set the default ring to 7 and this works  also .  My final solution is to just turn off the answerer function for the time being.

I will recheck several time during the day  to confirm my solution and advise
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: RIMDO on March 28, 2020, 09:51:30 AM
Good to see this thread after, I posted my issue.


Why my OBI200 call acting weird?
http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=16880.0 (http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=16880.0)

@SteveInWA

As you suggested, I will open my thread at https://support.google.com/voice/thread/new?hl=en (https://support.google.com/voice/thread/new?hl=en)

Thanks for your guidance.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: FromNY on March 28, 2020, 10:22:44 AM
Thank you SteveInWA for your reply and sportflyer for posting solution.
I tried restarting cable modem, router and obi 202 but it helped only with first incoming call. The rest of the calls were going to voice mail.
I also have Panasonic cordless phone (connected to OBI 202 on line 1) with answer function set to off. I rebooted cordless phone and just made 6 calls to it from two different phones and it looks like reboot of the cordless phone resolved issue with the incoming calls partially. Some incoming calls connecting and some are still going to voice mail.
Thank you.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: MarkS49 on March 28, 2020, 10:46:53 AM
I have same issue with Obi 200. Phone has no answering machine. No settings have been changed for over 2 years. First occurence was 3/27/2020 about 4:30pm CT.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: zorlac on March 28, 2020, 11:38:24 AM
I've got it too, been happening a couple days now.
I've done everything but delete it from obitalk and start over.
Think GV's infected?   :o
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: CPC_obi on March 28, 2020, 12:48:43 PM
I am having the same problem for the past few days.

Most.. incoming calls are dropped as soon as I try to answer them.   Outgoing calls are fine.

I have had the same setup for a very long time, OBI200 with the same phone, cable modem and router.   I have made no changes to any devices or settings.  Today I tried restarting / powercycled everything including the phone, router, cable modem, obi200... and the problem continues.

CPC

Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: sir_rob on March 28, 2020, 01:57:59 PM
Same issue here.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: sportflyer on March 28, 2020, 03:23:18 PM
Maybe try to reboot your phone?
My problem seems to be fixed after reboot and turning off Answerer. I am also using Obi200. See my posts above.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 28, 2020, 04:07:28 PM
This has nothing to do with firmware, nor your Panasonic phone.  However, if you are using Google Voice incorrectly, that's another issue:  do not use an answering machine with Google Voice.  Let Google Voice be your "answering machine", and, if you have any linked phone numbers (e.g. a conventional land line or mobile phone number), you must enable Conditional Call Forwarding on all of those phone numbers, or else one of them may grab calls before you can answer on the OBiTALK device or on one of the other linked devices/numbers.

I've escalated this to Google Voice engineering, but as I've stated, between this being a weekend, and the virus, I do not expect immediate resolution.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 28, 2020, 05:29:58 PM
Please don't waste your time posting here.

Post here:  https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738 (https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738)

Post from the same Gmail account that holds your Google Voice phone number.  Post the last four digits of your Google Voice phone number, and post several examples of calls that rang, but disconnected upon answer, including the date, time and timezone. 

Google Voice engineering will be working on this on Monday.  Thanks.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: QSnexus on March 28, 2020, 06:10:21 PM
Quote from: SteveInWA on March 28, 2020, 04:07:28 PM
This has nothing to do with firmware, nor your Panasonic phone.  However, if you are using Google Voice incorrectly, that's another issue:  do not use an answering machine with Google Voice.  Let Google Voice be your "answering machine", and, if you have any linked phone numbers (e.g. a conventional land line or mobile phone number), you must enable Conditional Call Forwarding on all of those phone numbers, or else one of them may grab calls before you can answer on the OBiTALK device or on one of the other linked devices/numbers.

I've escalated this to Google Voice engineering, but as I've stated, between this being a weekend, and the virus, I do not expect immediate resolution.

That would be easier said than done in my household. While I would have no problem with Google Voice handling the voice mail for home phone, my wife and kids are very used to having a physical answering machine on our 6 x cordless home phones in every room and they like that they don't need to use an app to check anything and hear and see the flashing lights and beep tones on the base station and handsets for missed calls & VM's (we wouldn't like the voice mail to the kids GV anyhow).  When her parents, who speak only Mandarin and Taiwanese, come to visit us for months at a time every year they don't have smartphones that can access the GV app (let alone attempt to utilize the Google Voice app + website which can only be displayed in English (on any device) even though the Android phone or web browser is set to Chinese language native at the OS and browser level) and play the messages on answering machine when here (they only need to know how to press the play button under the flashing light on base station).  That is the primary reason why we still use have an answering machine enabled on Google Voice + Obi200 + home phone.  I would believe that others in this thread reporting the issue are in the same boat.

At the moment we do have it working this way, with answering machine off, because that is they only way that we are able to answer the incoming home Google Voice calls (we aren't attempting to answer the phone using the actual house Panasonic phone handsets), for now we use our two cell phones with GV to get around the call answering issue, as that works fine to answer calls, until the back-end issue is resolved.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 28, 2020, 06:18:02 PM
Quote from: QSnexus on March 28, 2020, 06:10:21 PM
Quote from: SteveInWA on March 28, 2020, 04:07:28 PM
This has nothing to do with firmware, nor your Panasonic phone.  However, if you are using Google Voice incorrectly, that's another issue:  do not use an answering machine with Google Voice.  Let Google Voice be your "answering machine", and, if you have any linked phone numbers (e.g. a conventional land line or mobile phone number), you must enable Conditional Call Forwarding on all of those phone numbers, or else one of them may grab calls before you can answer on the OBiTALK device or on one of the other linked devices/numbers.

I've escalated this to Google Voice engineering, but as I've stated, between this being a weekend, and the virus, I do not expect immediate resolution.

That would be easier said than done for my house. I would have no problem with Google Voice handling the home phone voice mail, my wife and kids are very used to having a physical answering machine on our 6 x cordless home phones and likes that she doesn't need to use an app to check anything and hear / see the lights on the base station for missed calls/VM's, and as well when her parents who visit us for months at a time during the year they don't have smartphones that can access voice mail and they like to check voice mail when they are here.  That is the primary reason why we still use have an answering machine enabled on Google Voice + Obi200 + home phone.  I'm going to believe that others in this thread reporting the issue are in the same boat.

I understand, but honestly, I don't see that as a valid excuse.  If you only want to use Google Voice as a free phone line, then use a bare-bones SIP VoIP ITSP instead, like Callcentric or voip.ms.  Your use case is NOT what Google Voice is intended to support.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: Taoman on March 29, 2020, 12:20:14 PM
According to an "engineer with the Google telephony backend" the issue with incoming GV calls to OBi devices disconnecting should now be fixed.

https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738?hl=en&msgid=36528947 (https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738?hl=en&msgid=36528947)

Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 29, 2020, 06:17:23 PM
Quote from: QSnexus on March 28, 2020, 06:10:21 PM
Quote from: SteveInWA on March 28, 2020, 04:07:28 PM
This has nothing to do with firmware, nor your Panasonic phone.  However, if you are using Google Voice incorrectly, that's another issue:  do not use an answering machine with Google Voice.  Let Google Voice be your "answering machine", and, if you have any linked phone numbers (e.g. a conventional land line or mobile phone number), you must enable Conditional Call Forwarding on all of those phone numbers, or else one of them may grab calls before you can answer on the OBiTALK device or on one of the other linked devices/numbers.

I've escalated this to Google Voice engineering, but as I've stated, between this being a weekend, and the virus, I do not expect immediate resolution.

That would be easier said than done in my household. While I would have no problem with Google Voice handling the voice mail for home phone, my wife and kids are very used to having a physical answering machine on our 6 x cordless home phones in every room and they like tht they don't need to use an app to check anything and hear and see the flashing lights and beep tones on the base station and handsets for missed calls & VM's (we wouldn't like the voice mail to the kids GV anyhow).  When her parents, who speak only Mandarin and Taiwanese, come to visit us for months at a time every year they don't have smartphones that can access the GV app (let alone attempt to utilize the Google Voice app + website which can only be displayed in English (on any device) even though the Android phone or web browser is set to Chinese language native at the OS and browser level) and play the messages on answering machine when here (they only need to know how to press the play button under the flashing light on base station).  That is the primary reason why we still use have an answering machine enabled on Google Voice + Obi200 + home phone.  I would believe that others in this thread reporting the issue are in the same boat.

At the moment we do have it working this way, with answering machine off, because that is they only way that we are able to answer the incoming home Google Voice calls (we aren't attempting to answer the phone using the actual house Panasonic phone handsets), for now we use our two cell phones with GV to get around the call answering issue, as that works fine to answer calls, until the back-end issue is resolved.

In that case, you are not the target user for Google Voice.  Get a bare-bones SIP DID number, or port out your Google Voice number, to a SIP ITSP such as voip.ms or Callcentric.  You can either use their voicemail, which will correctly activate/deactivate your phones' message waiting LEDs and stutter tones, or, turn off their voicemail and use the answering machine.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 29, 2020, 06:19:34 PM
Quote from: Taoman on March 29, 2020, 12:20:14 PM
According to an "engineer with the Google telephony backend" the issue with incoming GV calls to OBi devices disconnecting should now be fixed.

https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738?hl=en&msgid=36528947 (https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738?hl=en&msgid=36528947)



"Under-promise; over-deliver".  You're welcome.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: jldeon on March 29, 2020, 06:31:07 PM
Quote from: SteveInWA on March 29, 2020, 06:19:34 PM
Quote from: Taoman on March 29, 2020, 12:20:14 PM
According to an "engineer with the Google telephony backend" the issue with incoming GV calls to OBi devices disconnecting should now be fixed.

https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738?hl=en&msgid=36528947 (https://support.google.com/voice/thread/36202738?hl=en&msgid=36528947)



"Under-promise; over-deliver".  You're welcome.

Thank you for your attention to this issue! 
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: QSnexus on March 29, 2020, 11:34:21 PM
Thank you SteveInWA for your attention to this issue and assisting people with placing reports to Google about it, and thank you Taoman for reporting it was fixed here. A big thank you to the Google telephony engineer Anders Kristensen who actually fixed this issue today with Google Voice calls on Obihai devices. I have tested it thoroughly on my OBi200 and the issue is indeed fixed.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: bsdaiwa on March 30, 2020, 06:43:32 AM
Where do you find the setting for Conditional Call Forwarding?
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on March 30, 2020, 04:23:17 PM
Quote from: bsdaiwa on March 30, 2020, 06:43:32 AM
Where do you find the setting for Conditional Call Forwarding?

Conditional Call Forwarding is a feature that is provided by your telephone carrier.  It means "when the carrier number is busy or not answered our out of service/powered off, forward inbound calls to some other telephone number".  This is different from UNconditional Call Forwarding ("Immediate" call forwarding), which sends all calls, immediately, to some other phone number.

Each carrier uses different star (*) codes to activate or deactivate the feature.  A few carriers (Verizon Wireless, and MVNO Ting are examples) enable their customers to control this setting from their customer web site.

If you don't know the code(s) to control CCF, then contact your carrier.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: andyhi on April 01, 2020, 01:47:12 PM
Not sure if it's related, but looks like GV is having issues.

http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=15627.0


In the last couple of days I've had countless calls disconnect and then I get "The number you dialed XXX has not received a response from the service provider" when trying to dial out to any number.  Effects both GV lines on an Obi202 until I power cycle the Obi.   Time to disconnect is random... I've been on 3 hour calls with no issues and then have the problem happen three times in 20 minutes.  Sometimes issue resolves itself if I wait it out.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on April 01, 2020, 01:48:46 PM
Quote from: andyhi on April 01, 2020, 01:47:12 PM
Not sure if it's related, but looks like GV is having issues.

http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=15627.0


In the last couple of days I've had countless calls disconnect and then I get "The number you dialed XXX has not received a response from the service provider" when trying to dial out to any number.  Effects both GV lines on an Obi202 until I power cycle the Obi.   Time to disconnect is random... I've been on 3 hour calls with no issues and then have the problem happen three times in 20 minutes.  Sometimes issue resolves itself if I wait it out.

NOPE.  The thread you linked is over a year old.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: andyhi on April 01, 2020, 02:27:33 PM
Agreed, that thread was started over a year ago.... But look at the last page.  There are a number of reports in the last several days that the issue has recently returned.  Issue appears to be related to capacity, connectivity, or changes being made on GV backend.


Correction... correct link - http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=15592.20
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on April 01, 2020, 02:31:40 PM
Quote from: andyhi on April 01, 2020, 02:27:33 PM
Agreed, that thread was started over a year ago.... But look at the last page.  There are a number of reports in the last several days that the issue has recently returned.  Issue appears to be related to capacity, connectivity, or changes being made on GV backend.

Hunh?  It's a one-page thread, and the last post on that thread was dated March 14th, 2019.

Regardless:  there are no such issues at this time.  I'm the leading Google Product Expert for Google Voice, and I am in regular contact with the people at Google who run the service.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: andyhi on April 01, 2020, 02:42:06 PM
And more reports: http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=16895.0
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: mcmancuso on August 06, 2020, 03:58:24 PM
I've been having this issue daily for the last few months, still happening as of this week.  Line rings once or twice, I answer and only hear dial tone.  Obi200, latest firmware.  Whatever the issue is, it persists.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on August 06, 2020, 04:02:50 PM
Quote from: mcmancuso on August 06, 2020, 03:58:24 PM
I've been having this issue daily for the last few months, still happening as of this week.  Line rings once or twice, I answer and only hear dial tone.  Obi200, latest firmware.  Whatever the issue is, it persists.

More detail, please.  What happens, from the caller's end?  What do they hear?  Does their call get routed to your Google Voice voicemail greeting, or does it get routed to one of your linked phone number(s)' greeting, or what, exactly?

Look at your Google Voice calls log (on a desktop web browser, at https://voice.google.com/u/0/calls (https://voice.google.com/u/0/calls)

Are there records of those calls?  If so, are they calls from your contacts, or from some other desired caller, or are they robocalls/junk?
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: mcmancuso on August 12, 2020, 10:58:37 AM
The issue happened again today, call came in, 1 ring, tried answering it, and I just heard dialtone, the google voice connection continued to ring via google voice app on the PC, but not the connected phone number

>What happens, from the caller's end?  

I have been unable to confirm this since I can't reproduce the issue when I call the number, and so far since you've asked for the information the callers have all been business customers who are not the same person when I call the line back.


>What do they hear?  

per above, I cannot confirm this

>Does their call get routed to your Google Voice voicemail greeting, or does it get routed to one of your linked phone number(s)' greeting, or what, exactly?

the linked number does not appear to ring when the issue is happening, but when I call from my personal cell (not linked to google voice) which does not initiate the issue, it IS ringing the connected number.

>Look at your Google Voice calls log (on a desktop web browser, at https://voice.google.com/u/0/calls  Are there records of those calls?

yes there are records

> If so, are they calls from your contacts, or from some other desired caller, or are they robocalls/junk?


I can't tell, I can definitely confirm at least one of them is from a business, but I can't confirm if any of the dozens of others are or not.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on August 12, 2020, 04:24:16 PM
What you're describing is typically caused by one of your linked/forwarding phone numbers.  When the inbound call rings your Google Voice number, Google Voice rings any web browser clients, any Android or iOS clients, and all linked phone numbers.  If one of those linked phone numbers is turned off or busy, and you have not enabled Conditional Call Forwarding on that number, then that number will answer the call before any of the other destinations have a chance to answer.

Use a desktop/laptop computer's web browser, not a tablet or smartphone, sign into the correct Gmail account that holds your Google Voice phone number, and go here:

https://voice.google.com/settings (https://voice.google.com/settings)

Look at the Devices section and the Linked numbers section.  Delete all devices and/or numbers that you no longer use.  If one or more linked numbers remains, then those numbers must have Conditional Call Forwarding enabled.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: mcmancuso on August 13, 2020, 01:10:29 PM
What conditional call forwarding feature/status needs to be enabled on the single connected phone number we have on the line?
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on August 13, 2020, 03:58:00 PM
You need to enable conditional call forwarding on your linked phone number.  The * command to do that varies by carrier, and some resellers (MVNOs) don't support it.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: mcmancuso on August 17, 2020, 08:16:48 AM
I don't want my cellphone number calls ringing the google voice line, wouldn't setting the call forwarding cause this?

[
Quote from: SteveInWA on August 13, 2020, 03:58:00 PM
You need to enable conditional call forwarding on your linked phone number.  The * command to do that varies by carrier, and some resellers (MVNOs) don't support it.
Title: Re: OBI 202 with GV: incoming calls issue
Post by: SteveInWA on August 17, 2020, 10:00:28 AM
NO.   Conditional call forwarding only forwards your mobile phone calls to Google Voice's voicemail, if the mobile phone number is busy or unanswered.  Your Google Voice phone number won't ring in these cases (unless you intentionally set it to do so).