VOIP ATA provided by Verizon does not work

Allow me to explain first, this is a small business business account, not residential service. I do not see a forum dedicated to business accounts.

Business FIOS was just installed, including VOIP service on two subscriber lines ported over from a well-known cable company. Verizon delivered three VOIP desksets and one ATA device. The ATA (Audiocodes MP 202) has not worked yet. All the expected green LED indicators turn on, and I can tell from my router web admin dashboard that the ATA is acquiring a network address (just like my three VOIP desksets do). If a conventional phone is connected to the ATA, the ATA provides a dial tone but upon dialing there is a brief pause followed by a rapid busy. And, the phone thus installed will not ring for incoming.

A Verizon tech came yesterday, spent some time with the ATA, and told me he believes it is defective. He arranged for a replacement to be shipped.

I think it is unlikely that the ATA is faulty, and I am wondering if what I am trying to achieve can even be provisioned. Perhaps a reader of this can tell me. Even with VOIP working, I'd like it to remain possible to connect conventional older phones to the ATA, and place and receive calls on the same subscriber numbers that have just moved to VOIP service.

I am aware of the web configuration tool for my VOIP service, and I have the ATA configured as "share" on the two lines, while the "primary" on each is assigned to one of the VOIP desksets.

Many thanks.

Accepted answers

JustinG1

I see.

Unfortunately, I wish I could help more but it sounds like Verizon has their own way of doing VoIP. However if you give business tech support a call I'm sure they could help figure this out.

I have a feeling the issue is with the ATA and the main desk phone being "shared", and that is possibly causing the issue.

All comments

TomH121

Found this url

Please note date

https://forums.verizon.com/t5/Welcome-to-the-Small-Business/Welcome-to-the-Verizon-Small-Business-Forums/m-p/147826#M1

Hope it works to solve your specific problem

JustinG1

Hello!

What you want to achieve by allowing older phones to connect to the new VoIP service is most certainly achievable, and your current setup sounds correct.

It sounds like there is a software configuration error somewhere rather than the ATA itself being faulty, as you assumed. Unfortunately, I've never seen what Verizon's VoIP portal looks like, so I wish I could help troubleshoot more there.

When you stated that you have the ATA set to "share" on the two lines, have you tried setting all devices (phones and ATA) to Primary? And how many phone numbers do you have?

Normally how I've seen VoIP service work is you have 1 public phone number, and each phone/device gets an extension. So for example your 2 desk phones would be extensions 100 and 101, and the ATA would have an extension of 102. Do you know if this is how Verizon setup your phone network?

Sofox

Thank you for replying.

Here are some answers. You asked if we subscribed to two external numbers, or just one with extensions. The answer is, two numbers, no extensions, for historic reasons. This is a church, with a main number and a separate number for the youth leader, something that was instituted about 20 years ago. While telephony has gone through revolution, we left things that way, for consistency's sake with the wide range of ordinary people served. I will admit it is a little cringeworthy.

On the other question, attempting to establish the ATA as Primary: that occurred to me as well, and I did try that. No help.

The web interface for setting up the topology, provided by Verizon, is very frustrating and tedious. It also seems to have a "dumber" (for lack of a better word) granularity of definition for the ATA.

One final remark, the MAC address on the ATA is known to correctly match Verizon's records. Really, the whole thing has the feeling that Verizon never really registered the thing, even though they sold it to us. The Polycom desksets all work.

Again, your kind interest is very appreciated.

Sofox

Thank you for providing that URL leading to a forum meant for small business. However, it appears to be closed down, and all the posts that I can see are very old.

JustinG1

I see.

Unfortunately, I wish I could help more but it sounds like Verizon has their own way of doing VoIP. However if you give business tech support a call I'm sure they could help figure this out.

I have a feeling the issue is with the ATA and the main desk phone being "shared", and that is possibly causing the issue.