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Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

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TaintMe
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Registered: ‎02-04-2020

Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

For about a week we have had a very noisy line. The online test found no fault and I have removed all other devices and plugged the phone directly into the main socket without any change to the noise.

 

Attached is an attempt at recording the noise using an iPad, noise can be heard if volume is turned up. The actual sound in the phone’s earpiece is much louder, making hearing people difficult to impossible.

 

Any advice on what to do next from Plusnet support would be appreciated. Understand problems responding given the current situation.

 

22 REPLIES 22
Gel
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Try relevant links below; try a different handset- may be the phone has gone faulty?
Though Argos closed, you can order products online for collection at Sainsburys.
TaintMe
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Thank you for replying so rapidly, much appreciated.

I had tried three different cordless handsets with the same result. Also tried the other options except for BT speed test, which Firefox and Safari both report the site as untrusted due to incorrect configuration of their server.

 

One piece of information I forget to mention is that very recently there was a problem at the exchange, lots of users had no phone dial tone (broadband was still ok). The problem was fixed by BT Openreach.

Gel
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

TaintMe
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Thanks for the exchange checker link, bookmarked, currently no service issue logged.

TaintMe
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Managed to get through to tech support about 5pm, currently waiting for a call back…

TaintMe
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Fix

For anyone reading this in the future, should you too have a noisy phone line.

Talked to tech support again and they said ‘the exchange circuit was set to an SNR margin of 3 decibels on the broadband downstream, because the lines are very sensitive that margin is to low for the line to cope with.’ It has been reset to 9 decibels and the line is now quiet again.

Thanks again to Gel for his suggestions and links.

 

RealAleMadrid
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

@TaintMe  Sorry but I have never heard such a load of rubbish from Tech Support, A noisy phone line is nothing to do with the broadband settings on the line, it is generally caused by a physical line fault, such as poor connection somewhere on the phone line. This type of fault can be intermittent, often weather related, so may go away if the weather is warm and dry.

So apart from increasing the SNR margin which by the way will reduce your Broadband speed nothing has been done to cure the fault which will probably come back in the future.☹️

Lotta
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Hi,

I'm having the same problem. I spoketo someone at Plusnet last week and we went through all the tests to make sure my equipment wasn't faulty. It seems a ,ittle better so we left it that I'd change the batteries in my phone to see if that made a difference, and then I'd call back if I still had a proble.

It's still, having changed the battery, very crackly with the occasional loud click. When I try to ring the call centre I get a message saying they are not taking calls. I got the same message yesterday. I can't see any info to say the call centre is closed. Does anyone know how I can contact them? Maybe I'm just trying at a very busy time and should just try later?

Thanks,

Charlotte

Lotta
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Hi,

I'm new to this forum and have spent about 20 mins trying to work out how to post. No success so far. I just can't see where I can write a new post. Aaaaaaarrrrrgh!

Any help gratefully recieved!

BrightonRock
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

@Lotta 

Go to the board on which you want to contribute and click "Start a Topic". Here I am seeing that as a button above the list of threads.

Lotta
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

Hi,

Thanks your reply. I jsu can't see the Start a Topic button anywhere. Will attach a shot of my screen.

CharlotteScreen shot 2020-04-08 at 14.07.07.png

POMPEYFAN
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

I have the same problem. We had a simliar issue about eight months ago, it had been raining a lot. I have just gone on line and gone through the BS check this, check that prompts. I then go to the screen that says it will check my line.

Eventually it tells me there is a problem (Well done Sherlock). and I should phone the 0800 number. Due to CV-19, they are not taking calls.

So, I get everyone needs to stay at home, or work from home. Plus net are allegedly an ISP provider and as such would be better placed than most to get all their support staff to work from home, i.e. answering a phone, and using VPN to remote into a machine in their office. Why have they not set this up???

This is what my company has set up, so all of us engineers can continue to design our products.

So my noisy line, that also drops out for five minutes or more every hour looks like it will not or cannot be fixed until this crisis is over. Anyone have a crystal ball to tell me when that might be?

Plus net have been useless since we signed up with them. One month left of my contract that I cannot wait to get out of.

198kHz
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

@Lotta It's on the grey strip towards the bottom of your screenshot - just to the left of "New Fixes".

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TaintMe
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Re: Noisy line making calls difficult as I can’t hear half of what is said

The line noise miraculously (by coincidence) cleared up and was ok for about three days, then it rained heavily and the noise is back again, not yet as bad as before but getting there. I still have a fault report open and have updated the details as above.

Water ingress into the cables, probably from the pole to the house is possibly the cause, another coincidence is BT open reach working on a pole just round the corner. These lines are at least fifty years old and have never been reworked.