911 Dialing Woes With VOIP

I am one of those people who switched to voip (voice over IP) in response to the terrible land-line rates being charged. It hasn't gone trouble free, but I think it's worth it. So, this article is about one of my only problems with voip.

I go through Primus Talkbroadband, and have experienced the occasional mistakes on their side throughout my service. I haven't experienced any downtimes, although, many others seem to be. So anyway, today I went to call a number (9481180), and when I called, either my modem lagged, or there was a network error, but the phone skipped out the 4 and 8. So, of course, I was connected to 911.

How would you react if you heard "Hello, 911, what is your emergency?" when you were trying to call someone? I immediately said "Sorry, wrong number!". Then, I was called a hang-up, and transferred around to many other people. Try and explain to a dispatcher, then to the police, that you didn't call 911! I bet you wouldn't be having fun. Well, neither was I. They wouldn't give you any time to explain the situation, and acted like you called just to prank them.

I don't think there will be any fines, as I was not notified. It's quite a frightening experience, and this is the second time it has happened. So, a note to the wise, if you switch to VOIP, use your cell phone to call anyone who has the numbers 9 and 11 in them.