BT Digital Voice phones used as purely a DECT phone

[grahamb-uk]

I've learnt from forum posts that, in spite of the use of the SH2 WPS button to pair the BT phones, the phone is fundamentally a DECT phone using the DECT standard and in no way uses WiFi. If so, can I use the phone and link it to another DECT standard base. For background, I was BT with SH2, but as the price has doubled in 2 years, I've switched to Sky. I now have no phone system it would appear and the money I spent additional BT handsets is now e-waste. Happy to be educated on the position.

[imjolly]

The BT DV phones are not standard DECT and I don't think they will pair to a third party base and even if you managed you would have very limited functionality 

[VeteranISPUser]

Hi @grahamb-uk   I considered selling my old HD with Alexa phones on eBay, but the prices were so low I simply gave them away to another BT DV family member. You may consider keeping them just in case you return to BT in the future (remove the batteries).

[grahamb-uk]

Yeah, that's the conclusion I'm heading towards.

[grahamb-uk]

Increasing appears that way. The fact that I bought extra phones and all of this was not clear at the point of purchases leaves a very sour taste. I don't think the regulators have done the customers any favours. It appears the current systems mean BT have created something proprietary and the lack of standards has increased the chance of e-waste and customer wasted money. So with DECT, you could mix and match manufactures, but now BT have a functional rich solution, but created a tie-in that penalises me financially when I move on as a result of BT price increases of 100% in 26 months. We need a new (SIP based I presume) standard to protect the customer and solution to retain landline numbers very quickly with the move to DV. I  can only see ever more upset and frustrated customers going forwards. 

[rbz5416]

They should pair to a generic base station but with a basic feature set. ie they'll make &receive calls but little else.

[grahamb-uk]

I'd absolutely live with that - but haven't found how to do so yet. 

[rbz5416]

Just deregister from the SH2 & then combine the pairing instructions of the phone with those of the base station.

[grahamb-uk]

The SH2 is now de-installed - I'm no longer with them! I could re-power it and try, but not sure that works. I have done a factory reset which I presume does the same job. When I use the pair button on the DECT base (Panasonic), the device doesn't pair. Not sure where to go next - has anyone had first hand experience doing this this successfully with a BT. I'm sort of persuaded by @imjolly  answer that BT is not standard DECT - which is sort of an oxymoron!

[rbz5416]

"Factory reset" seems be be a rather ambiguous term these days in regards to what it actually does. I'd be inclined to fire up the SH2 & try the de-registration process (if there is one!) before trying to pair with the base station.

But having said that, previous posts suggest that a handset can't be paired with the SH2 until DV is active. So it's possible that you can't de-register without an active DV either. Only one way to find out...