The advisor was insistent that customers were using it. He said that he had taken a call from customers that morning who were having problems with it as when someone called his iPhone 6 that his wife's iPhone 5s with a different number also rang. I did try saying that on the EE website it states 'coming soon' but he was insistent that it was already released to customers. From what you are saying that is not the case.
That sounds like the continuity feature of IOS 8, it allows you to answer a call made to your iPhone from another IOS device or Mac that is on the same wifi network and logged in to the same iCloud account.
For example, if someone calls my iPhone then both my iPad and MacBook also display the incoming call and allow me to answer from them.
I would guess that the customer who had called was sharing the same iCloud login with his wife and hence the reason that her phone displayed the incoming call too.
Nothing to do with EE's Wifi Calling, just a part of IOS 8.
I spoke to my friend at EE who works in the network planning and integration team on Friday about wifi calling to see if any update.
He said that the service is on a friends & family along with closed user group trial, which has identified some issues in particular with two home broadband providers.
This is proving quite difficult to overcome as the issues lay with the broadband providers in how they have their network configured and another how they set their hubs/routers up. The providers do not seem to be in any rush to fix and patch this. Possibly due to thm being landline providers as well so maybe worried about falling home calls made.
As has been stated before this needs to work seamless with customers having to start tweaking and amending home broadband setups just to get wifi calling.
Meanwhile there is another team travelling out and about testing this on public wifi hotspots, on trains,underground and also they have started visiting some large EE corporate customers to test on their networks with one even setting up a new wireless AP just for staff to use for wifi calling as over 1200 staff in the office. Although are probably very confused why a new wireless network has appeared called EE wifi:)
He is not sure how much staff training has taken place on wifi calling he thought it was just a handful of managers and team leaders that had been trained,but comments on here may indicate that all staff have started having training this week hence the advisor thinking it was live now.
Great info thanks. I can see supporting this being quite hard for EE's call centre. So many people I know replace the ISP supplied router/home gateway device with an "up-market" model.
So many people I know replace the ISP supplied router/home gateway device with an "up-market" model.
Whilst this might be true amongst your friends, I honestly think that it is a tiny minority of all fixed line internet users who have the knowledge, let alone desire, to either purchase a NETGEAR / ASUS etc. router or build their own pfSense etc. unit.
Whilst this might be true amongst your friends, I honestly think that it is a tiny minority of all fixed line internet users who have the knowledge, let alone desire, to either purchase a NETGEAR / ASUS etc. router or build their own pfSense etc. unit.
Given how cheap (£50) you can get a TPLINK box in PCWorld or even Tesco, and that major ISPs such as Sky are still providing really poor WiFi (single stream 2.4Ghz with internal antenna) then yes, I think a lot of people are buying better/replacement routers. Some get friends to install.
This is of course driven by smartphones and tablets that want to be used all over the house, including kids bedrooms etc!
The advisor I spoke to was quite insistent that if I were to go straight out and buy an iphone 6 I would be able to use wifi calling straight away. Luckily I knew better than to trust him which was why I asked the question on here where I was more likely to get a truthful answer.
It's a shame EE advisors are not being given the correct information to give out to customers as had I taken his advice I would have been very disappointed. Yes, I know it will be live eventually but I don't intend to buy a phone or sign up to a package until I know for certain that wifi calling will be available on that phone and package.
Given how cheap (£50) you can get a TPLINK box in PCWorld or even Tesco, and that major ISPs such as Sky are still providing really poor WiFi (single stream 2.4Ghz with internal antenna) then yes, I think a lot of people are buying better/replacement routers. Some get friends to install.
This is of course driven by smartphones and tablets that want to be used all over the house, including kids bedrooms etc!
Of the big ISP I think Sky is the only one who doesn't give a decent router these days think all the rest do now.
It's a shame EE advisors are not being given the correct information to give out to customers as had I taken his advice I would have been very disappointed. .
Maybe it hasn't been "trained out" yet, friend of mine works in an EE call centre and he says most of the time they don't find out about things until a customer calls with an issue with it, then they ask their second line / tech team, sounds like they're really poor at actually telling their agents what's going on with the network.
EE's website has been updated and in places 'soon' has been replaced with 'now'. But there is no further information so they obviously got ahead of themselves updating part of the website.
Well that's interesting that the website has been updated about Wifi calling, As although I do not expect it to happen one of the original dates I was given for launch was today 29/10. It seems that it is taking EE a little longer than they thought to get a stable service and something easy for customers to use
It seems EE are trying to launch too many things at the same time. I noticed that after EE were promoting how we would soon be able to use our phones to operate our televisions, someone had commented on how it would be good if we could also use them to make a phone call!
Well that's interesting that the website has been updated about Wifi calling, As although I do not expect it to happen one of the original dates I was given for launch was today 29/10. It seems that it is taking EE a little longer than they thought to get a stable service and something easy for customers to use
Interesting.. I've been told for awhile now it was to be by the first week of November.
It's a shame that they can't at least give us more information such as which phones it will work with, do we need a certain broadband speed, do we need to be in a contract, will it be available to Orange and T Mobile as well as EE. If they are that close to launching they must have some information which would enable us to be ready to use it at launch.
It's a shame that they can't at least give us more information such as which phones it will work with, do we need a certain broadband speed, do we need to be in a contract, will it be available to Orange and T Mobile as well as EE. If they are that close to launching they must have some information which would enable us to be ready to use it at launch.
I don't think it will make that date either. They should be releasing details about it shortly. At this time i'm unsure if it's EE only. No technical reason for it not to be other than.. well, you know to sell 4G tariffs...
The information i have been told is Wifi Calling will just be EE 4G customers to start with and will start with a limited amount of handsets,Then over time this will increase and may become available to Orange & T Mobile
The service is in final testing phase with some staff using it as well as in closed public trials.Even though its likely to miss the 29/10-4/11 launch window Looks like the launch will be this year though
Looking forward to Wi-Fi calling. This is the only bugbear of EE over O2 is the in building coverage is sometimes problematic.
My Sony z1 compact on a 4g payg SIM has an ims registration state entry in the about phone section. I assume a SIM update kicks this into life.
My iPhone 6 Plus is on a SIM only t mobile tariff with another 6 months to run so I assume I have to run my minimum term before I can switch to a SIM only 4g tariff.
I hope EE publish details on what ports/IPs/URLs that it works on.
We have a lot of users on our BYOD wifi network that wasn't designed for this sort of use and could have a detrimental effect on normal traffic. It's something as a large LAN administrator that I would like to monitor and possibly restrict.
Comments
That sounds like the continuity feature of IOS 8, it allows you to answer a call made to your iPhone from another IOS device or Mac that is on the same wifi network and logged in to the same iCloud account.
For example, if someone calls my iPhone then both my iPad and MacBook also display the incoming call and allow me to answer from them.
I would guess that the customer who had called was sharing the same iCloud login with his wife and hence the reason that her phone displayed the incoming call too.
Nothing to do with EE's Wifi Calling, just a part of IOS 8.
Can't always trust what advisors say ;-)
He said that the service is on a friends & family along with closed user group trial, which has identified some issues in particular with two home broadband providers.
This is proving quite difficult to overcome as the issues lay with the broadband providers in how they have their network configured and another how they set their hubs/routers up. The providers do not seem to be in any rush to fix and patch this. Possibly due to thm being landline providers as well so maybe worried about falling home calls made.
As has been stated before this needs to work seamless with customers having to start tweaking and amending home broadband setups just to get wifi calling.
Meanwhile there is another team travelling out and about testing this on public wifi hotspots, on trains,underground and also they have started visiting some large EE corporate customers to test on their networks with one even setting up a new wireless AP just for staff to use for wifi calling as over 1200 staff in the office. Although are probably very confused why a new wireless network has appeared called EE wifi:)
He is not sure how much staff training has taken place on wifi calling he thought it was just a handful of managers and team leaders that had been trained,but comments on here may indicate that all staff have started having training this week hence the advisor thinking it was live now.
Whilst this might be true amongst your friends, I honestly think that it is a tiny minority of all fixed line internet users who have the knowledge, let alone desire, to either purchase a NETGEAR / ASUS etc. router or build their own pfSense etc. unit.
Given how cheap (£50) you can get a TPLINK box in PCWorld or even Tesco, and that major ISPs such as Sky are still providing really poor WiFi (single stream 2.4Ghz with internal antenna) then yes, I think a lot of people are buying better/replacement routers. Some get friends to install.
This is of course driven by smartphones and tablets that want to be used all over the house, including kids bedrooms etc!
It's a shame EE advisors are not being given the correct information to give out to customers as had I taken his advice I would have been very disappointed. Yes, I know it will be live eventually but I don't intend to buy a phone or sign up to a package until I know for certain that wifi calling will be available on that phone and package.
On the current 17.1 carrier settings it's not there.
Here is a pic of a US T-Mobile iPhone with both the toggle and the signal bars at the top displaying T-Mobile WiFi.
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=wifi+calling+t-mobile&espv=2&biw=1280&bih=899&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=vghEVOjaNaXj7QazuoCoCg&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAw#tbm=isch&q=turn+on+wifi+calling+t-mobile&facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=AD12JUHmAx414M%253A%3B5W01nFAPCiKL3M%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.imore.com%252Fsites%252Fimore.com%252Ffiles%252Fstyles%252Fxlarge_wm_brw%252Fpublic%252Ffield%252Fimage%252F2014%252F09%252Ftmobile_wifi_calling_hero.jpg%253Fitok%253D1OwvfKf9%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.imore.com%252Fhow-turn-and-wi-fi-calling-ios-8%3B1600%3B1200
Of the big ISP I think Sky is the only one who doesn't give a decent router these days think all the rest do now.
Maybe it hasn't been "trained out" yet, friend of mine works in an EE call centre and he says most of the time they don't find out about things until a customer calls with an issue with it, then they ask their second line / tech team, sounds like they're really poor at actually telling their agents what's going on with the network.
Interesting.. I've been told for awhile now it was to be by the first week of November.
It's a shame that they can't at least give us more information such as which phones it will work with, do we need a certain broadband speed, do we need to be in a contract, will it be available to Orange and T Mobile as well as EE. If they are that close to launching they must have some information which would enable us to be ready to use it at launch.
I don't think it will make that date either. They should be releasing details about it shortly. At this time i'm unsure if it's EE only. No technical reason for it not to be other than.. well, you know to sell 4G tariffs...
The service is in final testing phase with some staff using it as well as in closed public trials.Even though its likely to miss the 29/10-4/11 launch window Looks like the launch will be this year though
I'm not sure which Android handsets support IMS out of the box....
My Sony z1 compact on a 4g payg SIM has an ims registration state entry in the about phone section. I assume a SIM update kicks this into life.
My iPhone 6 Plus is on a SIM only t mobile tariff with another 6 months to run so I assume I have to run my minimum term before I can switch to a SIM only 4g tariff.
Oh interesting, I have a nexus 5 and it doesn't mention IMS in the about phone section.
We have a lot of users on our BYOD wifi network that wasn't designed for this sort of use and could have a detrimental effect on normal traffic. It's something as a large LAN administrator that I would like to monitor and possibly restrict.