cellphone question- emergency calls only ?
 

I work at a defense contractor in an old building. Recently I have been getting error messages on my cellphone when trying to make a call. The message states " emergency calls only " and the only option when this message pops up is to hit " ok ". But nothing happens when you hit ok. Not sure if IT at work is making changes or not. Anyone else get messages like this ? Anything that can be done to correct ?

I get those when I have no service, or when my sim card went tits up

Sounds like a sim card error i was having on my HTC 8X when i first bought it. I guess the sim tray wasn't holding the card in place well enough. I just made sure the sim was really clean, and jammed it in there so it made good contact. All better now.

Yep, that's usually an indication that you don't have a connection to your cell provider, but you may have a connection to another providers network that will let you male emergency calls or you're cell provider doesn't recognize your phone as being authorized on the network.

I'm only guessing but if it was SIM card wouldn't I get that message all the time ? Outside of work I don't recall ever getting the message. Thanks for the replies.

You likely buttdialed 911. Many cell phones lock on 911 only once it's been dialed. You need to pull the battery to reset. There likely is a menu that turns it off as well, but pulling the battery works. I work in the 911 industry and we get dozens of these a week.

Maybe the defense contractor has cell jammers installed in the building?

I'll vote SIM card. I once had a POS Samsung on the POS AT&T network and I had the same error intermittently until the third new SIM card finally did the trick. Just for the record AT&T may be great in your neck of the woods but there coverage is worthless in my AO. -J


ETA - You should be able to stop by a local store and have them swap in a new SIM card FOC. They may want to test it first but no reason a new SIM should cost you anything by time.

I seem to only have the issue when at work I have not been able to duplicate the error outside of work. For now I'll let it go but thanks for the tips on the SIM card.