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-   -   SIP Broker now supports Toll Free terminations (https://forum.sipbroker.com/showthread.php?t=1283)

Tony 03-21-2007 10:25 AM

SIP Broker now supports Toll Free terminations
 
SIP Broker now supports terminations to toll-free numbers in North America. All users of Voxalot and SIP Broker can now dial these toll free numbers by using the SIP Broker dialling convention:

*1800
*1866
*1877
*1888

For example to dial Diners on +1 800 234 6377 within either Voxalot or SIP Broker just dial: *18002346377

The benefit of this solution is that it eliminates the need for you to create special dial plans with specific voice service providers that support 1800 terminations.

kurun 04-01-2007 11:51 PM

It appears that these are not working currently. Could you please verify? Maybe, I'm missing something. Thanks (Tested *18002632263 - MasterCard)

martin 04-02-2007 12:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kurun (Post 7362)
It appears that these are not working currently. Could you please verify? Maybe, I'm missing something. Thanks (Tested *18002632263 - MasterCard)

Just tested *18002632263 and works fine.

kurun 04-02-2007 01:17 AM

Thanks, Martin.
Yes, you are right. It works from an IP phone logged on the account, but does not work from an ATA registered on the same account. Not sure why, as *18 is not a documented call feature and the ATA[*] features are actually turned off.
I'll do a bit more looking.

Note added 2007-07-04 :
For the record, the problem was caused by having 2 SIP devices (SIP phone, and ATA) behind NAT logged on to the same account. After some tweaking of the STUN server settings, and port forwarding on the router, I could get both devices to work reliably when calling Toll Free numbers. Also, an incoming call rings both devices until one is picked up or call goes to voicemail.

nettoyeur 04-03-2007 05:03 PM

Restricted dialing area?
 
*18663977875 "The number cannot be reached from the dialing area":confused:

DracoFelis 04-04-2007 03:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kurun (Post 7371)
Yes, you are right. It works from an IP phone logged on the account, but does not work from an ATA registered on the same account.

It should work from a properly setup ATA. I know it works fine from my ATA (an SPA-3000, with a "dial plan" that has been extensively customized by me).

IMHO it should work from most model ATAs out there, with proper setup. The main thing you have to watch for, is to make sure your adapter is setup to send the dial string to SIP Broker (or VoXaLot) and not "eat" those digits.

For example, if you were using a LinkSys/Sipura adapter, it's simply a matter of properly setting up your "dial plan" to pass that dialing pattern. The default dial plan for a LinkSys/Sipura adapter doesn't work well for such dialing (and for that matter, the default LinkSys/Sipura dial plan doesn't even support SIP Broker). However, it's reasonably easy to modify the dial plan to properly support all SIP Broker dialing, including the new toll free dialing.

DracoFelis 04-04-2007 03:36 AM

"Out of area" toll free numbers.
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by nettoyeur (Post 7444)
*18663977875 "The number cannot be reached from the dialing area":confused:

Happens all the time with toll free numbers and VoIP (For example, Free World Dialup's toll free service has the same "problem"). What is going on is this:

While a lot of companies with USA "toll free numbers" allow them to be called from anywhere "in the country", this isn't true of all toll free numbers. Some companies with toll free numbers, choose to limit them to a specific calling area near where their service is. For example, some companies that only serve a single state, may limit their toll free calls to only coming from phones "in that state".

Now the problem arrives when you want to call one of these "restricted area" toll free numbers from VoIP. Because, from the perspective of the toll free number you are calling, your call is coming from the place where the SIP Broker service enters the telco lines (for the toll free call), which is likely not anywhere near where you physically have your own VoIP located. And if SIP Broker enters the telco service outside the "calling area" of your toll free provider, than you will likely get a message such as you experienced.

So what can you do about it? Not much, I'm afraid. You can try alternate toll free services (for example, when SIP Broker's doesn't work, try FWD's, etc), in the hopes of "getting lucky" and having one of the VoIP to toll free "gateways" being "local" to the toll free number you want to call. Or you could try borrowing a local telco/POTS phone if/when you just have to call that toll free number. Or you could even try talking the company with that toll free number into changing it so that it works in more areas/states in the USA (fat chance with some companies).

But in the end, this is a limit of how the company you are calling chose to setup their toll free number. So ultimately, it is neither in your hands nor in SIP Broker's, but rather in the hands of the company who setup that specific toll free number...

jgxenite 06-17-2007 12:31 PM

Hello,

I was just wondering if there are any plans for allowing calls to free phone (aka toll free) numbers in the UK (0500, 0800, 0808)? This would be really useful as I occasionally need to call these numbers, and they aren't free from my mobile (but local calls to the PSTN access number are).

Thanks in advance,
James

DracoFelis 06-17-2007 03:57 PM

UK Toll free, may be possible via Free World Dialup.
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by jgxenite (Post 9547)
I was just wondering if there are any plans for allowing calls to free phone (aka toll free) numbers in the UK (0500, 0800, 0808)?

I don't know if SIP Broker (or VoXaLot) itself is planning on UK toll free calling (probably depends upon if/when some UK provider wants to offer that service to SIP Broker). However, in the mean time, Free World Dialup (provider code *393 from SIP Broker) does offer UK toll free dialout service:
FWD toll free info

So in theory at least (I don't know any UK toll free numbers to test this against), you should be able to dial UK toll free numbers (from VoXaLot, SIPBroker, or the SIPBroker PSTN numbers), by first dialing *393 and then dialing the FWD code for a toll free UK number.

NOTE: Don't forget that FWD's toll free dialing also starts with the *-key. Which means that if/when you use your own adapter to dial this sequence, you would have to make sure that you can enter the *-key also in the MIDDLE of your dialing (as * is a special dialing key for both SIP Broker and for Free World Dialup, and you would need to use it in both places to dial: SIP Broker => FWD => UK toll free ). And "by default" most VoIP adapters won't let you use the *-key anywhere other than the first character. So you might want to check your VoIP adapter's configuration before trying this (for example, LinkSys/Sipura adapters need their "Dial Plan" customized before this sort of dialing will work)...

jgxenite 06-18-2007 06:55 AM

Hello DracoFelis,

Thank you very much for this. I've tried this from Gizmo and the PSTN access number, and both work fine :) (apart from connection taking about a minute from the PSTN number).

I was just wondering though, do you know what "restrictions" there are on toll free number calling? The FWD website mentions there are restrictions, but doesn't say what.

James


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