BT advanced digital phone with Alexa

[raymond1234]

Have been advised by BT that I will be switched to digital service, so for-warned is fore-armed as they say.

Got in touch with BT and this is what seems to have transpired

I have ordered a BT advanced digital phone with Alexa and assured that it also included a answering machine - no mention of this in the phone details as far as I can see, this will be supplied free of charge.

Can anyone confirm there is an answering machine function?

Ordered 3 addition essential hand sets at a cost of £19.99 - seems like a bargain  as I was thinking of updating my phones anyway.

As my line rental saver is up for renewal this month asked about this and both call advisors have told me once I have changed over will no longer have to pay line renal - is this true ?

Glad to hear from them that there seemed to be general confusion over the change, expect a lot of people will suddenly find their phones stop working and then being unable to telephone BT to try and sort out!

;

[imjolly]

you will still pay line rental and advisors are wrong

with the alexa handset you can link that to your mobile if it also has alexa added and that way you can your your existing contacts in your mobile phone.  it give ability to voice dial contact and save having to add your contacts to your DV phone

[raymond1234]

Strange that both of them said the same thing, will have another go another day. Need to see if I can get Alexa on my iPhone now.

[licquorice]

Line rental is inclusive of whatever package you have, it is not a separate item. Broadband doesn't arrive by magic, a line is still needed 😀

[NeilO]

Hi @raymond1234 it doesn't have a built-in answering machine but it has a voicemail button for the 1571 answering service.

Does the BT Advanced Home phone with Alexa built-in have voicemail?

​Digital Voice customers have free access to BT 1571. It answers your phone when you can't. Callers can leave a message, which you can hear by pressing the Voicemail button on the handset or dialling 1571. If you’ve got messages waiting for you to listen to, you’ll see an icon on the home screen of the phone, showing the number of messages and depending on your settings, you can also hear an alert.

Thanks

Neil

[raymond1234 · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the reply, so far 1571 for me is a pain, I need to pick up phone to hear tone, will be interesting to see if the icon is enough to alert me.

[jonstatt]

BT have lowered the cost of the two primary handset types (there is a third type, advanced without Alexa). 20 pounds for 3 essential or 30 pounds for one Alexa.

What is silly though is the Alexa one has access to your contacts from your mobile phone, but can't sync them to its own contacts book. This means no way to get the contacts onto the essential models.

These phones badly need a way of mass transferring contacts unless I am missing it.

[VeteranISPUser]

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@jonstattwrote:

These phones badly need a way of mass transferring contacts unless I am missing it.

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Hi @jonstatt   

Apparently there is a work-a-round but I don't know if Alexa gets in the way, i.e. you may see all contacts twice on the Alexa phone. I tried the first steps which worked. I exported all my Outlook contacts and imported them into Google Contacts. I then exported the Google contacts to a VCF file. I haven't got DV yet but apparently you can then import this file into your SH2.

Re: BT Advanced Digital Home Phone vs BT Advanced ... - BT Community

[jonstatt]

@VeteranISPUser  Excellent. Thanks. Will give it a try.

[VeteranISPUser]

Hi @jonstatt   Please let us know how you get on 😀  For most of us just planning on what works when I replace my premium phone which does sync with my mobile phone.