The telephone is the one thing that is most likely to save your life in an emergency. I’m your resident telephone systems geek. Here’s what you need to know about having a working telephone during power outages, such as the planned PG&E outage in California that should be occurring today and may continue for the next few days.
This story has six sections: 1. Cellphones, 2. VOIP landlines (Sonic, Comcast etc.), 3. “POTS” landlines that work in outages, 4. Landline phones that work in power outages, 5. Voicemail, and 6. Workplace telephone systems.
1) Cellphones.
Cellular service will be spotty at best. Keep your mobile charged, use it only for urgent calls.
Cellphone towers depend on grid power. Most cellphone towers have backup batteries that will keep them working during brief power outages (less than a day). After that time, those towers will go out of service and you will not be able to reach them. Or you may see fewer “bars” than normal, so you’re reaching a more distant tower than normal. Some major cellphone towers are equipped with backup generators: these will keep working during lengthy power outages.
The reduced number of working towers mean that there will be “traffic jams.” Towers have limited capacity to carry calls. Therefore it’s vitally important that you keep your calls few and short, so others with urgent calls can get through.
To keep your mobile device charged, you can get a solar charger with a USB connection, or a crank-driven device with a USB connection. Free Play is the most well-known and respected maker of crank-driven radios: you should always have one for emergencies anyway, so get one that has a USB port for charging your mobile device. These are widely available from various online sellers.
Mobiles’ standby time is reduced substantially by “social” apps and other apps, because the apps run in the background all the time and use power for transmitting/receiving data while your phone is idle. To maximize standby time, get rid of the non-essential apps. They won’t save your life in an emergency.
2) VOIP landlines (Sonic, Comcast etc.):
Many people today get their landlines via their broadband provider such as Sonic, or cable TV provider such as Comcast.
If you have oldschool DSL, see section (3) below.
If you have Comcast or any type of fiber-optic broadband such as Sonic, or certain types of “bonded copper” broadband such as Sonic, or in general if your landline phone is plugged into your broadband provider’s device, you have VOIP (Voice Over Internet-Protocol).
The broadband providers’ devices that connect their circuits to your home network, have backup batteries that are designed to last for a couple of hours at most. That is not “talk time,” that’s “standby time in total.” After a couple of hours you will not be able to use your broadband service or phone service.
If your broadband provider’s device or cable TV provider’s device has a power switch, turn it off immediately to conserve its backup battery. Turn it on briefly while making phone calls (give it a few minutes to boot up), and then turn it off again. Merely unplugging it from the wall power socket won’t help because the battery will continue to power it. Only an “off” switch that also turns off the battery will work for saving battery for urgent calls. If you don’t know, contact your broadband provider or cable TV provider to find out.
3) POTS landlines always work during outages.
This is your oldschool landline that does not come through your broadband or cable TV provider. If you have oldschool DSL such as certain AT&T or Sonic services, you probably have this. POTS stands for Plain Old Telephone Service, as in, phone service that always works, regardless of power outages or anything else.
In some areas, what appear to be POTS lines are actually VOIP to a device on the telephone pole or other junction box on the street that provides service to your house, and these may go down during power outages. The only way to find out is to contact your telco and ask if your line will continue working if the grid power is out for a couple of days. If Yes, great. If No, not so good.
If you have a POTS line, you can make and receive calls normally, so feel free to blab all night by candle light, and enjoy the fact that you still can do something we all took for granted until recently. Needless to say, I have POTS lines, and will not be letting them go.
4) Telephones that work in outages:
Cordless phones’ base stations depend on grid power, so during an outage, they will stop working. What you need is an oldschool telephone that does not require batteries. The industry standard in the USA & Canada is the “type 2500” touchtone phone. These are still made to the same specs as they were in the 1960s. The last remaining US manufacturer is Cortelco in Corinth Mississippi, whose corporate history goes back to Kellogg Switchboard & Supply in the late 1800s (BTW I don’t work for them).
Look up “Cortelco 2500” online and you’ll find these. They come in three versions: a) Assembled in USA, b) Assembled overseas, and c) “Electronic ringer” (sometimes mis-labeled as “electric ringer”). It’s important to get the right type for your application. Prices vary from about $25 for the overseas version to about $50 for the USA version.
If you have oldschool POTS service, you can use any of those three types.
If you have VOIP-based landline service, you will need to get the type with “electronic ringer.” Here’s why:
The “Assembled in USA” and “Assembled overseas” version use mechanical bells (the classic sound of a ringing phone). The bell requires correct standard ringing voltage, which is 90 volts AC at 20 cycles per second. POTS landlines provide that standard ringing voltage. VOIP lines usually provide a lower voltage, such as 60 or 75 volts AC, and sometimes use a different frequency such as 30 cycles per second.
Thus, the “Assembled in USA” version, and most likely the “Assembled overseas” version with mechanical bell, will work on POTS lines, but most likely will not work on VOIP lines.
However, the “electronic ringer” version will work on any type of landline. It rings with a reasonably-pleasant electronic warble.
All of these have controls on the bottom for turning the volume of the ring down to quiet or up to loud. They all have volume controls in the handset for turning up the sound in the receiver. They don’t have Caller ID but you don’t need that in an emergency: just answer the phone and if it’s a telemarketer, hang up immediately. They come in a bunch of colors such as black, white, various “ash” and “beige” and the like colors, and red. I always recommend using a red phone for emergency backup service, because it’s really clear what that is and what it’s for.
5) Voicemail.
Voicemail is provided on a machine at the telco’s central office, so it will keep working during any power outage. If you expect a power outage, update your voicemail greeting to say so:
“Hi, this is (name). We are having a power outage, so I will only be able to check voicemail once or twice a day. Leave a brief message, and always include your name and your phone number to be sure I can call you back. Don’t leave more than one message: I’ll call you back when I can. Thanks.”
Tell your friends, family, loved ones, etc., in advance: that they should only leave one message and you’ll call them back when you can. Tell them that if they’re worried they shouldn’t be, or at least they shouldn’t overload your mailbox with “worry calls,” because worrying doesn’t make anyone safer.
After the outage is over, remember to change your voicemail greeting back to normal. And remember, use a strong password: pick a word or phrase at random, that is six to ten letters in length, and use that (spell it on the touchtone keypad).
6) Workplace telephone systems.
This is what I do professionally and I could write ten more pages about the options that are available. The simple version is, talk to the company that maintains your office telephone system, and ask to speak with one of their engineers or technicians if possible. They’ll give you a list of options and the cost of each, or your sales or customer service rep can give you the costs of each.
For outages of less than a day, a backup battery called an Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS) may be sufficient. NOTE: If you get a UPS, it MUST provide “true sine-wave power,” NOT “stepped wave” or “approximated sine-wave” or any such nonsense. True sine-wave power is essential, otherwise your office telephone system WILL get random malfunctions that are hard to diagnose. I can explain in more detail if anyone’s interested.
If your office phones are VOIP to the desktop, you will also need a UPS for each of your Ethernet network switches that provide power to the phones. The way you can tell the difference is: The wire from the wall outlet to a “digital” office phone is conventional “flat” or “skinny” modular cord, with a conventional small modular plug at each end. The wire to a VOIP office phone is an Ethernet wire, which is a round wire, with an Ethernet plug at each end, same as your desktop computer.
For lengthy outages, you’ll need one of two things:
If you only have a few outside lines, and they are POTS lines, you can have your telephone technician provide “power fail jacks”, one jack for each outside line. Then get one Cortelco 2500 telephone (see (4) above) for each outside line. Plug them in and they’ll work during outages.
If your outside lines are VOIP such as through your broadband provider (Sonic, Comcast, etc.), or if they are PRI trunks or SIP trunks (larger office systems, typically from about 20 phones to hundreds or more; my average client is in the range of 50 — 200 phones and typically uses PRI trunks), you will need some kind of extended power supply on-site such as a generator, or you will need some kind of off-site backup (guess what I was doing all night?). Most providers of PRI and SIP trunks can arrange for “power-fail transfer” or “unreachable call-forwarding” of your outside phone numbers to other destinations.
The simplest “destination” for that, would be one or more mobile phones that the company maintains, and that can be kept constantly charged (someone with working power can take them home as needed). Be sure to have an appropriate voicemail greeting on the mobile’s mailbox, for example:
“You have reached (name of company or organization). Due to the power outage, the office is closed at this time. Please leave a message including the name of the person you want to reach, and your name and telephone number, and we will return your call as quickly as possible. Thanks for your patience.”
There are other options for off-site backup, such as “hosted PBX” service for a few key people in the company. Hosted or “cloud-based” PBX doesn’t have enough functionality for full-time use in many types of office environments, but it’s viable for power-fail backup service. I can discuss further if anyone’s interested.
7) Other: I’ll be back later…
I’ve been dealing with off-site backups and other stuff for my clients, so I may not be around much to reply to comments, but I’ll try.
Editorial comment: If you are in an area where power outages may be an issue, get an oldschool POTS landline and a red Cortelco 2500 phone. It’s worth the cost, the audio is much better than mobile, and it can save your life in an emergency. The telephone is not a toy or a game, and its essential emergency functioning should not be compromised for the sake of TV, games, social media, or other non-essential functions. We all need to push back against Big Tech’s attempt to turn every form of communication into “entertainment” at the expense of conversation, and at the expense of reliable service in emergencies.
Lastly, everyone in for victory: donate to candidates, volunteer for candidates, GOTV like your life depends on it. Sign up for Act Blue, any monthly amount helps. “Staying home” doesn’t just happen on election day. Every day is an opportunity to GOTV, and every missed opportunity is another form of “staying home.” So let’s get out the vote: millions more votes, millions more Democrats going to the voting booth, millions more votes for victory over the Regime, and a strong nationwide mandate for Democrats.