Polycom CX/VVX Phones - Why did my Transfer Fail?



I received an email from a client this week that users at his site could not complete transfers from their Polycom CX or VVX desk phones. Tranfers using the Skype for Business client worked perfectly, but any transfer via the desk phone failed. The client said when they initiated a transfer from a desk phone, it would either transfer to dead air or reply with a busy signal. This happened when the phone tried to transfer to an extension or the full 10 digit DID.

I broke this problem down into several things I wanted to examine. First off, was there something on the phone that wasn't allowing the transfer? I've found Polycom phone configuration files to be a blessing and a curse. You can edit the configuration files to do almost anything, however, searching thru 60-70 pages of a configuration guide to find the one setting you need can be... challenging?

Yes, challenging. We'll go with that. 😏

As it turns out, there is a field that needs to be enabled for transferring. Feel free to copy and paste the line below into a config file (.cfg) and then upload it to a phone to test:

<CONFIG_FILES
call.BlindTransferSpecialInterop="1"
/>

The other side of this issue is in Skype for Business. The cleint's user dial plan allowed for international calling and I specifically configured normalization rules for multiple internal number ranges at his site. I assumed that the phone would use the same dial plan as the user. Dialing out through the phone worked, but when a user tried to transfer a call it would fail. Are the phones using a different dial plan for transfers, somehow? Spoiler Alert: Yes.

To get transferring to work (along with the configuration change above), I had to add the same normalization rules in the user dial plan to the global dial plan. Once the normalization rules were in the global dial plan in Skype for Business, transferring worked like a charm.

I have a small request for this article - if you are someone who is better than me at Polycom phones, please explain if this is normal. Most phones I've worked with have transferring enabled by default. As for using one dial plan for making calls and another one for transferring - why is this a thing?

Comments and questions are always welcome.





4 Comments

  1. Hello UCCrab. Are you using latest firmware (which version exactly)? Did you try with a different/older release as well?

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  2. Ricardo,

    Here are my client's firmware versions for each model they have deployed:

    Polycom Trio : 5.5.2.11338
    Polycom VVX: 5.6.0.17325
    Polycom Soundpoint IP 650: 4.1.1.0731

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    Replies
    1. Try it with 5.6.1 or even with the fresh new 5.7, as i feel this must be a bug.

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