Troubleshoot Home Phone voicemail issues

What happens when you call your Home Phone number to try and leave yourself a voicemail message?

• Your voicemail feature may be turned off. On your home phone, dial *90, wait for the dial tone to return, then dial *92. This will make sure all calls are directed to your voicemail when your lines are busy or if no one answers. Hang up and call your home phone number from another line to test your voicemail. If it doesn’t work, try the next step.
• You may have Call Forwarding turned on. Dial *73 on your home phone to turn it off. Hang up and call your home phone number from another line to test your voicemail. If it still doesn’t work, try the next step.
• Sign into MyRogers to confirm if the voicemail feature is part of your Home Phone plan. If not, you can contact us to have it added to your account (a monthly fee may apply).
• If you’ve tried the steps above and are still having issues, please contact Technical Support and we’ll be glad to help you.

You hear this message: “Your call has been forwarded to a voicemail service that has not been initialized by the customer you are calling. The Rogers customer you are calling is not available at this time. When you reach the customer at a later date, please remind the customer to access their voicemail and initialize their mailbox. Thank you.”

You haven’t set up your voicemail feature yet. Visit Set up and check your Home Phone voicemail to learn how. 

Your phone may be set to the voicemail feature of your answering machine (many cordless phones now include this feature by default).

How to tell if you have a built-in answering machine:

• Most answering machines use a male voice whereas Rogers voicemail features a female voice for the standard greeting.
• Some phone sets have live auto playback of the person leaving you the message – you can hear this from the base of your phone set.

Refer to the user manual for your phone set for steps to disable the built-in answering machine. Call your Home Phone number from another line to test your voicemail. If it still doesn’t work, try the next step.

You may have Call Forwarding turned on. Dial *73 on your home phone to turn it off. Hang up and call your Home Phone number from another line to test your voicemail. If it still doesn’t work, try the next step.

Record a new personal greeting and call your Home Phone number from another line to test your voicemail.

If none of these steps resolved your issue, please contact Technical Support and we’ll be glad to help. 

Your phone may be set to the voicemail feature of your answering machine (many cordless phones now include this feature by default).

How to tell if you have a built-in answering machine:

• Most answering machines use a male voice whereas Rogers voicemail features a female voice for the standard greeting.
• Some phone sets have live auto playback of the person leaving you the message – you can hear this from the base of your phone set.

Refer to the user manual for your phone set for steps to disable the built-in answering machine. Call your Home Phone number from another line to test your voicemail. If it still doesn’t work, try the next step.

You may have Call Forwarding turned on. Dial *73 on your home phone to turn it off. Hang up and call your Home Phone number from another line to test your voicemail. If it still doesn’t work, try the next step.

If none of these steps resolved your issue, please contact Technical Support and we’ll be happy to help you.

What happens when you dial *98 from your home phone?

• Try checking your voicemail from another Home Phone set to determine if the dial pad on your original phone set is the issue.
• If you don’t have another phone set, you can log into Online-Voicemail. Or check from a cell phone by calling 1 877 643-7786 from within Canada and the US or 416 901-6245 if calling internationally. If your password works then your Home Phone set is likely the issue.
• You may need to reset your password. You can contact us to recover your password.

Please contact Technical Support for help. 

Someone may have left you a blank voicemail message. Press 33 to skip to the end and 7 to delete

• Dial 1198 from your home phone. If you can’t access your voicemail, try the next step.
• Try checking your voicemail from another Home Phone set to determine if the dial pad on your original phone set is the issue.
• If none of these steps resolved your issue, please contact Technical Support and we’ll be happy to help you.

Which voicemail notification/forward isn’t working?

• Make sure the power cord is securely connected on both ends.
• To check that the Message Waiting indicator has not been turned off:
• • • Dial *98 from your home phone.
    • Enter your voicemail password. If you’ve forgotten it, you can contact us to recover your password.
    • Press 4 for Personal Options.
    • Press 1 for Outcall Notification and listen for the Message Waiting indicator status message.
      • If you’re prompted “To turn Message Waiting indicator on…”, follow the prompt to turn it on.
      • If you’re prompted “To turn Message Waiting indicator off…”, follow the prompt to turn it off. Wait for the confirmation message and then follow the prompts to turn it on again. This will reset the feature.
    • Unplug your home phone set’s power cord, wait at least 1 minute and then plug it back in. Leave yourself a voicemail message to test the Message Waiting indicator.
•  If the Message Waiting indicator is still not working, please contact Technical Support for help.

First, keep in mind: If the Voicemail to MMS feature is set to forward the notifications to a non-Rogers number, you’ll only receive notifications for voicemails that have been left by Rogers, Fido or Chatr users. If you’re impacted by this, we recommend setting up the Voicemail Notifier or Voicemail-to-Email features instead.

• Log into Online-Voicemail with your Home Phone number and voicemail password. Select the Voicemail Settings tab, then choose Voicemail to MMS on the left menu. Make sure that the feature is turned on (the checkbox should be selected) and that the phone number that the notifications are being sent to is as you expected. If needed, update the phone number and submit the changes. Leave yourself a voicemail message to test and if it still doesn’t work, try the next step.
• Turn the Voicemail to MMS feature off and back on by unchecking and then rechecking the checkbox. Leave yourself a voicemail message to test and if it still doesn’t work, try the next step.
• If you have another cell phone number, update the Wireless Number field and select Submit. Leave yourself a voicemail message to test and if it still doesn’t work, try the next step. If the feature works for the new number, you’ll need to contact the service provider for number that’s not receiving the notifications/forwarded voicemails.
• If none of these steps resolved your issue, contact Technical Support and we’ll be happy to help.

• Check that the voicemail messages are not being sent to your spam/junk/clutter folder and check for any mail rules that may place the emails into a folder other than your Inbox. Mark the messages as “not spam/junk/clutter” or remove the rule if necessary.
• Log into Online-Voicemail with your Home Phone number and voicemail password. Select the Voicemail Settings tab, then choose Email Address on the left menu. Make sure that the email address(es) displayed are accurate. Leave yourself a voicemail message to test and if it still doesn’t work, try the next step.
• Remove any email addresses by selecting Edit. Then turn the feature off by unchecking the checkbox and selecting Submit. Then, re-enter the email addresses(es), turn the feature on by checking the checkbox, select Submit and test again.
• If none of these steps resolved your issue, please contact Technical Support so we can help.

Have an important or sentimental voicemail message you want keep permanently? While messages on your home phone are automatically deleted after 45 days, you can save voicemails you want to keep permanently from the Online-Voicemail page.

• Log into Online-Voicemail with your Home Phone number and voicemail password.
• Once logged in, select a voicemail message from your Inbox.
• Select Save.
• A window will open. Select a folder to save the file. You can also rename the file if you want. Select Save. The file will download to your computer.

When the download is complete, you can open the file to play it, open the folder where the file is located, or close the window.

Keep in mind:

• The audio file is in standard MP3 format, which is compatible with most computer operating systems and media players.
• There’s an option to delete the message. If you delete the message, it will be deleted from your Home Phone voicemail as well. Messages deleted from your voicemail cannot be restored, so use this option carefully.

 Wireless voicemail help page >

Set up and check your Home Phone voicemail > 

Set up additional features for your Home Phone voicemail >

Manage your Home Phone voicemail notifications and messages >