Problem with Call-Waiting on 700W

[treo-man]

Hi All,

Have any of you had either or both of the following problems?

1. When on a call and another call comes in (Call-Waiting notification) and I choose to ignore it...after a few moments the Missed Call notification appears and then I am disconnected from the original call. It happens every single time. Verizon has replaced the phone but the same problem occurs.

2. While using Voice Mail, if another call comes in (..again, Call-Waiting notification), Voice Mail becomes completely inoperative (..can't skip messages, can't save them and can't even end the Voice Mail call (..that is without ending both calls). There is no way (no button or function) to ignore the incoming call. So this essentially locks up the phone unless I press END...which, of course, will disconnect both calls. Again, this happens every single time.

I spoke to both Verizon AND Palm about this and they say that they are aware of the problem and are working on correcting the bug. In reading through this (..and others) forum, I have seen nothing pertaining to this issue. So I was wondering if any of you have experienced this problem and what, if anything, you've done to work around it. Other than these, I've had no other problems with the 700W...but it is getting rather annoying. Since I use the phone heavily and frequently am on important calls that just can't be interrupted...they (the problems) virtually render the phone unuseable.

Thanks much, Steve

[jet64]

I have the exact same problem. Working on third phone and same issue. About ready to give up.

[wenkev]

I am having the same problems. Always with the call waiting while making a call and seldom with the vm. I am onmy 4th new phone from verizon and no change at all. Have you had any success in fixing this? Ihave posted on another palm forum and have had no response.

[dstrahm]

Just so you don't feel singled out, I am experiencing that same "ignore the missed call message and the active call dies" issue. If you are in a very quiet place you can still hear the caller on the line and they can sometimes hear you. The only way to recover is to terminate the call and call them back. This is a real problem on a conference call and you are the moderator.

I have a few weeks left on the year warranty but from what you are saying it probably will not fix the problem. Like some of us with too much on our plates, it just gets befuddled and drops the ball (call?) sometimes.

I have found that if I hit the "ignore" menu item then the missed call notification does not come up and the in process call continues unaffected. It takes a quick hand.

[PalmOSFan]

For what it's worth, I've had the same problem with call waiting disconnecting my first call while using my Treo 680 on Cingular. I suspect it's a Palm problem given the different carriers and different OS's. I'm curious to know if Palm has provided a timeline for this "little" quirk. It's frikkin annoying!

[hlmthead]

I have had this same problem for over 6 months. It all started after I upgraded the phone to the latest version of software. Verizon replaced my phone a couple of times but I still had the same problem because each of the replacement phones came with the new software. I contacted Palm and they are useless. I did figure out one work-around. When this happens, if you turn on the speakerphone the call you were on is "reactivated". You can then turn the speakerphone off and listen through the earpiece. I have no confidence that this problem will ever be fixed.

[kvance]

I have a 700WX from Sprint and it has the same call waiting issue. I have found one workaround, not perfect but it works. When the call "appears" to drop (my phone also shuts off the screen) do the following steps:
1) Hit the green power button.
2) unlock if necessary
3) Hit the right "menu" button
4) Select speakerphone (you can now hear your caller)
5) hit the right "menu" button
6) unselect speakerphone

This is a pain but at least I can continue the converstation without having to redial.

[scbysnx]

yeah I've got the same problem I play the same game kvance does... it'd be nice though if it just worked like a normal human being would expect a phone to work

[ChipD]

I have the same problem with being cutoff.

I have had the same problem with the voice mail however I finally figured out if you tap on the screen behind the one you are viewing which sometimes is the volume control and others it will usually let your phone send the touch tones signals again.

[ponycar]

Same problem here. I do the same pestidigitation act using the speakerphone. I even warn my current caller what's about to happen so they don't hang up (I've gotta talk fast though! )What a pain!

BTW: The following give a little insight to the wierd way our phones (I suppose ALL CDMA phones) handle call waiting.

This is from of an article dated December 4, 2005 from www.treocentral.com (http://www.treocentral.com/content/Stories/720-1.htm):

Call Waiting

Management of two concurrent calls is still limited due to the CDMA network's implementation of call waiting. You can answer a second call and swap between them, but not conference them. You can only make a conference call when the second call is outgoing. Also, when two calls are active and your press hangup, you hangup both calls. To return to the first call, wait for the person on the second call to hangup.

New for the Treo 700w, you can ignore a new call and respond with text message. Simply press menu and select "Ignore with text message".

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So it may have nothing to do with the software or the hardware, but with the CDMA network itself! They don't seem to have been able to fix it in the last two years.

I don't know if this is related somehow to the @#$&#$% shut down problem but it might.

Also, I read on another board (I forget which) that if you don't let the second caller hang up before you switch back to the first call, you're still being charged the minutes for both calls you see still running even if the other person DID hang up!