AT&T's VoIP Phone Service Has a Bad Day: Voice Quality Report

By Marisa Torrieri, TMCnet Editor

Just when some people, like my grandma, thought their trusty VoIP-based phone service would save them annoyances like fuzz and interference, news broke that a major operator's data networks went dead in nearly half of all U.S. states.

Those with AT&T's (News - Alert)new digital home phone service experienced a bit of a disruption Tuesday when its IP networks failed across the country. The problem, according to reports, illustrates continuing reliability issues with Internet-based phone service. Perhaps it also gives those of us without home phones a reason to snicker, but I'll save it for now.

Customers of AT&T Inc.'s U-Verse Voice reportedly said their landline phones have had no dial tones since early Tuesday morning. Those who were reached by cell were told a server crash brought down. U-Verse Voice in AT&T's entire 22-state local-phone service area.

AT&T spokeswoman Mari Melguizo said the outage started at about 10:30 a.m., and service was restored to most subscribers at 2:45 p.m. She said the extent the outage was unknown.

To date AT&T has a reported 1.15 million U-Verse Voice customers. Like Vonage (News - Alert)AT&T's service sends voice calls over subscriber's Internet connections.

Marisa Torrieri is a TMCnet Web editor, covering IP hardware and mobility, including IP phones, smartphones, fixed-mobile convergence and satellite technology. She also compiles and regularly contributes to TMCnet's gadgets and satellite e-Newsletters. To read more of Marisa's articles, please visit her columnist page.

Edited by Marisa Torrieri

(source: http://voice-quality.tmcnet.com/topics/phone-service/articles/86546-atts-voip-phone-service-has-bad-day-voice.htm)