We've Been Digitised

We have a cordless phone with handsets in the living room, “office” and “penthouse”.

This means we can contact Thunderthighs without bellowing up the stairs, and it’s easy to get to the phone before the answering machine clicks in.

Last week, when I rang them, both my sisters complained that when they’d tried to call my landline the phone had just rung out, nobody replied and the answering machine didn’t answer either.

I phoned my landline from my mobile and they were correct.

Making calls was fine so I phoned Virgin and, after grumpily jumping through the various hoops required to prove I am the person who owns and has authority for the landline and account I’m calling about, an engineer’s appointment was made.

Simon arrived promptly, checked the phone and explained

“You’re on a copper wire, the junction boxes aren’t being maintained as well as they used to be because the government has decreed that everybody goes digital.  Once upon a time we’d have found your outgoing copper wire in the box and swapped it to another port, but we don’t do that now because we’re transporting everyone to digital.   

We’re going to have to route your phone through your wi-fi router.”

“But that’s upstairs in the office.”

“We could move it down here.”

“Wouldn’t it be easier to move the base station for the phones up into the office.”

“It certainly would be if that’s ok with you.”

“The only difference is we’d have to go upstairs to see if there are any messages on the answering machine, but that’s no problem.” 

Also I frequently don't notice the answering machine light flashing for ages anyway. 

Up to the office we went where he produced a little gizmo and did it all.

 

He explained  “We’re transferring people by area, I’m mainly doing Hebburn at the moment.  They’re sending people the plug-in links and instructions in the post but an awful lot of people need help with them, or just don’t bother.”

Everything worked.

“You’ll find your outgoing calls are crisper too” he said.

For some months I’ve been blaming Bigsister’s phone for cutting off so one word in six went unheard.

When I phoned her yesterday to say the landline was back on every word was as clear as a bell.