The Telecommunications Department
Estate and Facilities Management

Telephone User Guide - Answer Phones and Fac Machines

Using answering and fax machines on the university's extensions
Answering machines (and faxes) are analogue phone substitutes. They can not be used on digital lines. A machine described as a digital answering machine digitises the incoming message and stores it electronically, not on tape; hence it may be described as digital. (Similarly, digital cordless phones also work only on analogue extensions. In this case digital refers to the way that the signals are encoded for transmission between the base station and the remote handset; signals to the exchange are still analogue.)
A recent feature available on some answering machines is "auto 1471". Within the university this feature must not be used. It is intended to dial 1471 after each message is received and thus record the number of the caller. However, any number starting with 1 will be redirected by the university's exchange for its own purposes - usually short code dialling to one of our remote sites. The rest of the number if long enough will be treated as an extension on that remote site. So if you have this facility available, please turn it off.
Not all answering machines work correctly with our system, and unfortunately some that do appear to be short lived. Contact the Telephone Systems Manager if you need advice.
Facsimile (or fax) machines are part answering machine, part modem, part scanner and part printer. Like answering machines, they are almost always used on analogue lines.
Beware of faxback information lines! These reverse data flow and you pay for the incoming fax, usually at very high cost per minute, and lots of minutes per page.