Poor Cell Service

[kkasun11]

Hello

I have two phones, one is work and one is personal.    One is an iPhone ProMax 15 and the other is a Samsung Galaxy 23.  They are on different plans.  Both say they have full WFi and 5G with full bars.  However every phone call I make has significant breaking up.  Usually it clears up some after about 5 minutes.

I work from home and I need to be able to speak on the phone. 

Please resolve this issue.

*The zip code is 40031.

[vzw_customer_support]

Hello kkasun11, thank you for reaching out to us. Have you tried to turn off Wi-Fi when trying to make a call? Have you tried to disconnect from the Wi-Fi connection and then trying to reconnect again to see if there is any improvement? 

~Ivone

[kkasun11]

I have tried that It doesn't work. The only way that I can have a phone call that isn't spotty is if I utilize FaceTime audio on my iPhone. Considering that I pay for network service that obviously is not acceptable.

[vzw_customer_support]

Thank you for the details. Is there a difference when you use Wi-Fi Calling? Does this only happen indoors? 

~Ivone

[SynthpopAddict]

I've been noticing this problem over the last month or so too!  It seems to happen when the towers are congested, calls are fine when less traffic on the towers.  When there's an issue, I can hear the other person, but they will tell me I'm cutting in and out.  Is this because:

-there are more 5G cells on the towers replacing the older LTE cells and phone calls are still going through LTE, so the remaining LTE cells get overloaded more often?

-with LTE having been commercially available since 2009 and no real incentive for carriers to maintain this older technology, maybe the LTE cells on towers are showing their age?

-are phone calls running through the 5G part of the network now so we need to disable VoLTE? (I can't figure out how to do this with Android 14, BTW.  When I had Android 13, disabling VoLTE broke phone calls to where they didn't work at all, so I turned it back on...but with recent network changes, maybe it's different now.)

-something else?

And before someone asks, yes, my phone is fully updated, I power cycle it at least once a week, Wi-Fi calling is not on, there is no blockage of the microphone, I do not have the microphone muted, and I've tested the audio of the microphone, which is working without issues.  I have between 2-4 bars of signal strength on my phone whenever I've noticed the choppy calls, so it is not a poor signal strength issue.  Going outside usually makes it better, but early last month when all 4 major university systems in my city were in the midst of final exams and it was the middle of rush hour with traffic all backed up for miles along the highway I live next to...had the misfortune of being on a call where the other person could barely hear me for at least 10 minutes even though I was outside...until I finally walked to a spot where I picked up 4 bars of signal and then the choppiness finally went away. 😞