Every once in a while, we at Northern Lights Fiber get a complaint about call disruption—a formal term for a frustrating concept usually referred to as a “dropped call.” And we totally share in your frustration.
There can be a few reasons why a call may terminate unexpectedly, from standard technical or weather-related hiccups to more complex matters related to different calling networks. Of course, we cannot control or explain the weather!
To start, Northern Lights Fiber’s fiber home phone service, Fiber Talk, is:
- Convenient – fast easy calls that are clearer than standard home phone! Also get your phone bill and internet on one monthly bill for easy payment.
- Cost effective – our fiber talk package is competitively priced and has loads of features powered through VOIP tech.
- Seamless – we transfer numbers, port to our service and you can use existing handsets
- Supported – our customer service and tech team is there to help and support you and ensure that your fiber powered home phone is an awesome experience
BUT there are a few things we also want to share with you to ensure that you have the best information and experience possible….
Understanding Voice Over Internet Protocol and Call Termination
To understand why some calls get suddenly dropped or why some calls “don’t go through” in the first place, we need to explain how Northern Lights Fiber’s Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls work.
Firstly, VoIP transmits its signal—your voice and the voice of the other caller—through the internet. After moving at ridiculously fast speeds, the signal (and your voice) then connects to its end point—i.e., a cellular phone—through a process known as “call termination.”
Call termination is the crucial step that lets Northern Lights Fiber keep you connected to family and friends over the phone as well as through email and social media. At its most basic, call termination simply refers to the process of routing calls from one phone company to another.
VOIP will reduce call issues from traditional landline and ensure that you have clearer, better calls across the board.
Dropped Calls Due to Call Termination Issues
Now, as the old saying goes, “it takes two to tango.” With call termination, there are almost always at least two parties (meaning, two companies) involved. And just as with tango dancing, sometimes things can get a bit tangled up—and in this case, that can lead to the dreaded dropped call.
Remember that with VoIP, lots of data is transformed instantaneously and then rapidly moved over the internet before hitting your phone in the form of your voice and the other caller’s voice. It’s a technological wonder, but one that sometimes hits snags over the networks. Hence, occasionally, customers will experience dropped calls due to call termination errors.
When to Call Customer Service
It’s tempting to call Northern Lights Fiber’s customer service when you’ve experienced a drop call seemingly out of the blue—especially when the weather seemed perfect on both ends of the call! But keep in mind that because there are often two calling networks involved in the call, Northern Lights Fiber’s customer service can only assist or investigate when you are the initiating caller—or when both callers are Northern Lights Fiber customers. That’s because any technical problem due to call termination errors is nearly always an issue with the calling network of the person who initiated the call in the first place.
When deciding whether to call Northern Lights Fiber’s customer service number, follow this rule of thumb: if you originated the call and the call was dropped, feel free to reach out to us at anytime; however, if you received the call from another person—and that person is not also a Northern Lights Fiber customer—there is unfortunately nothing we can do to assist with that call.
Please know that we are not trying to discourage you from reaching out to us! But we don’t want to waste your valuable time if the dropped call was initiated on another company’s network.
Just remember: we can investigate and assist with outbound call termination issues—the calls made by you on our network—just not inbound calls made to you by other callers from other companies’ networks.
If you are interested are interested in home phone service, call our customer care and get signed up today at 1-888-236-2947! Current internet customers can bundle home phone service and save money over standard pricing.
As always, please be sure you’re following Northern Lights Fiber’s social pages to learn more about how our high-speed fiber internet can help keep you in touch with your loved ones!