Examine your phone equipment for damage

Continue the examination of your phones to look at your cords. You're looking for any cuts, cracks, chew marks or loose wiring.

Even small nicks and cuts can cause an intermittent dial tone and problems with calls. Run your fingers along the phone cord to help you feel damage that might be hard to see. Replace any damaged phone cords and wiring that you can get to.

Depending on the location of the problem, trouble with your inside wiring can affect just one or all your phones. If you stumble upon bigger wiring issues, read more about how to get phone wiring and jacks repaired.

First, visually inspect each jack, looking for any obvious damage. Next, try to isolate which jacks, if any, are malfunctioning by figuring out if they're in service. 

Next, check that each jack is operating properly — starting with any jacks that look suspect.

If all your jacks have a clear, strong dial tone, the problem is probably with your phone. Try replacing it.  

If you hear a faint or intermittent dial tone, make a note of which jacks don't seem to be working and what you heard when you tested them. Next, read How to get phone wiring and jacks repaired.

It could be that your phone and jacks are not the problem, but rather, other home electronics could be interfering with your service. 

Equipment that can interfere includes satellite TV receivers, computer modems, caller ID boxes, fax machines, and alarm/security systems.

Typical symptoms of interference include noise on the line, cross talk/other conversations, busy tone while talking, and intermittent dial tone.

To test your equipment:

1. Unplug your phones from both their jacks and electrical outlets. 
2. Unplug any other equipment that uses a jack. 
3. After you've unplugged all your equipment, wait one minute and then plug a corded phone into each jack — testing one jack at a time. 

You should hear a clear, strong dial tone when you test each jack. If you don't, make a note of which piece of equipment is plugged in and what you heard when you tested the jack. 

If you're finding interference but don't want to unplug the offending piece of equipment, try installing a radio suppresser or radio/noise filter on your line.