I’m in the process of moving and I just opened my account with verizon the other day. I was thrilled to find out at that time that it would not be necessary for anyone to come out and that it would be possible for them to activate the line right from their office.
Wonderful!! I would be saving myself ridiculously (sp?) large amounts of money for the labor of having a guy come out, and I wouldn’t be stuck home twidling my thumbs in 4 hour blocks of time (as that is usually how they set up appointments).
Only problem is I’ve been unable to get a dial tone on any jack in the house. I called, and they ran a diagnostic and determined that the line is indeed active, so if I can figure it out on my end that would be best. (If I can’t they want $162 for a guy to come out, and then $50 for each additional jack!!!).
This is pretty far beyond my means right now. I’m renting a house with 3 other guys, and we are all pretty broke with all the moving in fees.
I’d sure like to avoid having a guy come out here. Are there any experts or simply knowledgeable people out there that might be able to give me some advice on how to find the problem myself. There are, I think, 4 or 5 jacks in the house and none are giving me any tone which seems to indicate that the indicidual jacks aren’t the problem (unless all just happen to be broken - not a completely unlikely scenario considering the last tenant was an alcoholic who took light fixtures, the thermostat, and the fridge with him, and left shards of glass on the floor unswept. He was evicted and may have had a grudge).
But assuming the individual jacks are fine, is there any place else I can look to find the problem? I’m not the handiest person in the world, but I can follow instructions. Is this something that a layperson like myself could handle?
You need to find out if the problem is in the house wiring, or on the telcos end. Find the box on the outside of the house, and open it up. There should be a test jack inside. Take a known good phone and plug it into the test jack and see if you get a dial tone. If you get no dial tone, it is on their end. If you do, you have a problem with your house wiring. I would think your landlord would be the one to call with this problem.
(This is the way it would work in TN with Bellsouth. YMMV)
You might check the box where the phone line comes into the house. There should be a screw that you can remove to get the cover off and tell if the former tenant disconnected anything. Also check to see if there is a phone type jack in one of the closets. Some houses have this as a point to check the line near where it enters the house. If there is one make sure it is plugged in.
If none of that works, call your landlord. It’s his/her responsibility if the problem is with the wiring in the house.
First, I would undo the jacks from the wall and make sure that they are hooked up. If they are, then make sure that they are all hooked up the same way. You only need two wires for a working phone line. If there is no wire at all, the a-hole probably took it for his own purposes. Now on the outside (usually, sometimes in the garage) there is another phone box. One side will say something akin to “phone company side” and the other “house side”. You (or the home owner) are responsible to pay for any repairs from this point to the jack. Make sure that the wires (should be 2) are hooked up from Verizon’s side to yours and from your side to the inside of the house. I do work in telecommunications, but I haven’t done phone for awhile now… I hope this helped.
If the house is hooked up with a fairly new interface, you should be able to open the box on the outside of the house where the inside wiring connects to the phone company’s lines.
Sometimes the box has a “user” half that is easily opened, and a “non-user” half that is better left alone.
There should be a standard modular jack there. The house wiring may be plugged into it, and if so, unplug that and plug in any standard phone that you know works. Since this jack goes directly to the phone company, you should get a dial tone if the line is truly active.
If you get the tone there, the trouble is in your house wiring. Happy tracing!
IANATM (I am not a telephone maven) but IIRC they cannot actually “see” into your house. The most in depth they can go diagnostically is the breakout box on the side of your house. Open the door on the breakout box with a phillips head screwdriver and plug a known good phone into the line one incoming jack. If you have a dial tone they have indeed provided you with service and the wiring in your house is where the problem lies. If there is no tone at the breakout box they are likely to be incorrect about having provided you with service.
You can buy a telephone jack diagnostic tool at Radio Shack for a few bucks that will let you check jack wiring.
Ok, thanks guys. I’m headin’ out there tonight (with a printed version of this thread) so I’ll check it out, and perhaps have further questions for tomorrow.
One more thing: (actually just reiterating somebody else’s thing, but it can’t be stressed enough)
If you find that the telephone company is correct, and has activated the lines it is reaponsible for, make sure you notify the landlord of his responsibility to ensure that the property has correctly wired jacks, in good repair. In California, a property owner must provide one jack; you’ll need to find out for yourself what that number is in Long Island.
Easy. What I did: Find the outside box, disconnect any & all wires from the two posts (remember where they went)…get a phone with a phone cord on it, cut the ccord so you expose two wires, red & black (are these the right ones?) plug each one onto a post & that should work.
You have to disconnect all wires to the posts in case one of them has a short, see (so said zee phone guy)
The last place I was renting had this problem too, 3 jacks which didn’t work. My land lord who worked for the phone company came over and pulled the inside plug from the wall, and then took his set of wire strippers/cutters and switched two wires around. That jack then worked, but he had to leave then. Later I pulled out the others, and did my best to copy what I saw him do. It was tricky since I didn’t have the proper tools, and even though there were only 4 wires I had difficulty remembering which ones he switched. Trial and error and about an hour did it, and I got the rest working. I can’t say which wires to swap because:
a) I don’t remember
b) Every town or company probably uses different colored wires
c) I’m not sure it was safe for me to be working with these wires… maybe I was just lucky not to get a shock
d) I’m not a phone expert anyways
My point is that this problem is fixable by yourself, but you ought to ask someone who knows what they’re doing first.
Ok, well I found the box and tested it. Incidentally, inside the box there was a little sticker with instructions. It said to plug the phone in and WAIT ONE MINUTE before lifting the phone to hear the dial tone.
Any idea why it would take a full minute? Anyway, I did this and got nothing, no tone. So am I to understand that it is on the phone company’s end?
Perhaps I didn’t wait long enough?
There have been a few posts involving manipulating wires and unplugging things. AFAI could tell, the wires were connected to where they should be. And in fact, this whole box apparatus thing seemed relatively new.
But, can anyone expand on the whole disconnecting/reconnecting wires thing? Doesn’t that test jack that I tried occur before we get to those wires? If so, being that there was no tone there, the wires that follow should have nothing to do with it, yeah?
If you plugged the phone into the test jack and got no dial tone, the phone company should fix it for free.
To be safe, you may want to disconnect all the wires from the house from any screw posts and test again - as handy says you may have a short in the house. Make sure to write down where the wires go so you can put it back together.
If you still get no dialtone, just start saying “Can you hear me now?” and see if they respond. OK, just kidding - call Verizon and they better fix it for free.
One thing: We had this same problem (I wish I knew how it got fixed, but I do know the phone company had to do it), and when I reported it- no dial tone, no response at the box they asked me if I could CALL the number- if I heard a ring from an outside line. Why they couldn’t check that, I don’t know, but they did come take care of it for free (I’m in NY)
Yes I did hear a ring, and when I told the phone company that they dispatched someone to look at our phone box. I wish I knew what they did, but they DID fix it. (In fact, this has occured twice, they fixed it both times). It’s weird- you’re using it fine then boom- dead air.