Old school party line question

[Kris80]

If you remember (or know) what a party line is maybe you can help. We have a party line at our seasonal location. For some reason we cannot call anyone in our family who is with public mobile. We are able to call other cell phone providers (bell, Telus, rogers and virgin mobile). Although we cannot call a public mobile number, that same person can call the party line with no issues. Additionally there were no issues in October 2022 when we closed the seasonal up. Bell said it’s our issue and not theirs. Is it possible public changed something that won’t allow a call to go through, but one can be accepted?

[Pey82ton2]

I’ve suggested trying a different phone but I remember trying cordless phones years ago but it messed up the party line and had to just use the old fashioned one. I just don’t understand how it can call the parent company and many others but not public. 

[hycm53]

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@Handy1 wrote:

@Pey82ton2  Back to the future they , lol haven’t seen it used one of them in years 

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Yep, only watch it on movies.

[Handy1 · Accepted solution]

@Kris80 .. that’s definitely a pickle , I’m not sure why Telus works and PM won’t , doesn’t make sense to me … just reach out to support in the meantime or until someone here figures out a work around 

[Kris80]

It’s a party line with a rotary phone. We cannot use a touch tone phone on a party line. Bell suggested it was a facility issue and not a line issue and their solution was to dial a 1 in front of the number. This only creates a voice recording saying it’s not a long distance number. There is no cell service for any provider in this area (remote) or we’d just cancel it. The solution may be having to move to a private line at an additional charge. It’s just odd that we can call any cell number or landline except public. 

[Handy1]

@Pey82ton2  Nice definitely brings back memories 🙂

[Anonymous]

@Pey82ton2 @Kris80 Is it possible that it's not converting the rotary phone analog to the right tones for the PM numbers?  It seems a bit far fetched because other numbers are working but only thing I can think of.  Possible to to put a touchtone phone on that line instead of the rotary?  Maybe you'll need an acoustic coupler to fire tones down the line to call PM numbers. 🙂 j/k

[Pey82ton2]

My 7 year old loves it lol

[Handy1]

@Pey82ton2  Back to the future they , lol haven’t seen it used one of them in years 

[Pey82ton2]

The bell guy called the line but wouldn’t go to the cottage to check as he said nothing is wrong. It doesn’t make sense as we tried several people we know with different carriers including Telus and they all go through. We’ve tried 7 public mobile numbers which are on 3 g and 4g plans and none work. All you hear is a fast busy. But we can call the party line fine. It’s a rotary phone too so you go around the wheel for each number and it pulses not touch tone. 

[Anonymous]

@Kris80 Do you get any sort of error message when calling a PM number from your seasonal?  I would have thought that Bell would have been able to tell you why it wasn't going through but it'd require them to put some effort into helping you troubleshoot it.  If it's not connecting from their network to PM, I'd guess there's a log somewhere they could check.

[Pey82ton2]

No she means party line. It’s 4 locations on 1 line split so you only hear 2 ring tones. Either a long and a short or 2 long together for example and you answer when you hear your ring.  I’ve already contacted a moderator and they don’t know what I’m talking about and say it’s on Bells side. 
when calling out all you hear is a fast busy. If she calls from the neighbour who has a private number the calls come through. Can public be blocking due to it being an unknown number?  

[Handy1]

@DennyCrane  No I think op means party line I remember these where 3 houses share same phone number but each has its own ring sound … was usually in the country … but I don’t know if it’s a PM issue or somthing they changed or not 

add you can reach out to support to ask and let us know what they tell ya please 

@Kris80 

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[DennyCrane]

I think you mean landline, not party line?