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Is anyone else experiencing frequent call interruptions using the RingCentral iOS app?


By "interruptions" I mean that I can be on a call for 15 minutes with no problem, when suddenly I hear the tone that sounds like RingCentral is dialing again. After 10 - 45 seconds the person I'm talking to is back. If they were talking they usually didn't notice that I was gone and they are still talking when I'm reconnected. If I was talking they usually say "where did you go?" Apparently, they just hear silence during the time RingCentral is reconnecting.


This seems pretty strange because the call isn't actually dropped. In other words, the person on the other end doesn't hang up, and I don't redial. On my side I don't do anything except wait and the connection is automatically re-established.


This is happening once or more every day. I can be on an hour-long call with no problem at all. Then during the next 15 minute call it might happen twice. It's very random, and it happens when I'm talking to someone on both cell phones and office phones.


I'm pretty sure this problem is specific to the RingCentral iOS app. I've never had a problem like this when using the RingCentral desktop app on my MacBook.


I've never experienced anything like this with other VoIP apps on my phone. Facetime, Zoom, GotoMeeting and similar apps never have a problem like this. We also have 2-hour team meetings twice a week using Zoom. In five months I've never had one of these Zoom video conferences interrupted. I also frequently stream music and Netflix movies and those experience no interruptions, so I'm sure my network is not the problem


I do a lot of customer support so this is really annoying. I've stopped using my iPhone whenever possible.


Comcast/Xfinity internet: 13ms ping, 100+ Mbps down, 6+Mbps up.


All software is up-to-date as follows:


Current version of iOS app is 10.1.0.1.8

iPhone X with iOS version 11.4.1


Any ideas what could be happening, or suggestions for how to troubleshoot this issue?



Hey Robert,

I haven't had experience with this issue myself. I see that you have a case open with us. Something very helpful for troubleshooting purposes is to get a Call Sample that is fresh (less than 24 hours old) and send us that info via your case.
Yes, it's happened twice already today on two separate calls. I've posted the information for the first call on our support ticket and will add the second call in a few minutes.


Robert- we are experiencing the same issues. Did you find a solution?
Hi Nicole,

No solution for me yet. I opened an official support ticket, and I suggest you do the same. Provide as much detail about your environment (router, firewall, internet service provider, cell phone model and service provider, etc) and include specific call date, time and caller phone number when the problem happened. They should be able to check their internal call records to confirm the problem and pinpoint a solution. Unfortunately, I've given them all that information, including several specific problem calls, and they never responded with anything useful.

RingCentral has a couple of different tests available on their support site. You should look for those and run them. Those tests claim to check the quality and capacity of your internet service. Those tests claim to simulate VoIP calls. If that's really true then any misconfigured router or firewall should be obvious when using those tests. I've run those tests many times over the past few weeks and they have never given me anything less than a perfect score.

At this point I've done everything I can think of to troubleshoot my problem. The list below might give you some ideas. First, eliminate the usual suspects, and then see if you are experiencing problems with anything else, or if it's just RingCentral.

1) Internet speed tests consistently show that my internet connection is stable, fast, and has very low latency (9 ms). RingCentral has their own tests and those confirm that I should be able to support 53 simultaneous calls, but I only have one RingCentral line.

2) I've checked my router and firewall settings numerous times and confirmed every setting. My Wi-Fi is only 5Ghz and I'm in the same room as the router, so there's little chance of any external interference.

3) I've uninstalled and reinstalled the iOS app several times and I'm sure I have the most current version.

4) The bubbling sound and call interruption happen in my home office when nobody else is home, so it's only me using the internet. During many calls I have to upload and/or download really large files to the person I'm on the phone with, and those file transfers have never interrupted a call.

5) I have been running graphical ping tests during calls that were interrupted. Those charts (which I also sent to RingCentral support) clearly show that my internet service did not drop or slow down during the call problems.

6) I started using the RingCentral app on my computer (MacBook Air) instead of my iPhone whenever possible. The computer is connected to the same Wi-Fi network so any local networking problems should also affect calls on my computer. I've never experienced the call interruptions on my computer.

7) About three times a week for the past 5 months I've had online video conference calls (not using RingCentral) lasting 1 to 3 hours. These video conferences involve 1 to 20 people and they are made from the same home office Wi-Fi using either my iPhone, iPad, or MacBook. After all those calls I've never noticed a single interruption, frozen video, or dropped call.

I will keep reporting any call problems by posting them to my existing support ticket. But at this point I'm pretty convinced that the problem is confined to the iOS app.

It would be helpful if RingCentral could provide some kind of diagnostic software that we could run for an extended time to simulate VoIP calls, but display useful debugging information.

As it is right now, the only way I can "diagnose" the problem is to keep using my iPhone when making phone calls to my customers. That's not acceptable and I will only use the phone when I'm away from my computer.


 

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