iPhone emergency calls only

kah22

My friend lost her old iPhone and bought a reconditioned iPhone 6s Plus to replace it. Because she is in lockdown between having her old phone blocked, buying a new one and then getting the sim a period of time passed. The replacement sim started working a few hours ago, I was able to call her. (I’m isolating to so trying to sort her out over the phone !)

My friend can receive calls but can’t make them. When she goes to make a call it says emergency calls only. She’s on a monthly business contract with o2 so I’m assuming it’s nothing to do with credit. A number of fixes I’ve read seem to date back from 2017 I’m assuming some of those fixes will be outdated. What should she do?

I suppose her next two problems are related. She doesn’t know how to get the apps on her iPad onto her phone, and how to get one to talk to the other. It’s just occurred to me that she hasn’t connected to the internet ! If that is the case once she has a connection should that fix the problem, or will she have to do something else ? She hasn’t access to a pc

Thanks for taking the time to answer, neither us are that tech aware, but she’s miles behind me 🤓 so baby steps please

Stay safe
Kevin

GTR_King

Hey mate hope your well...
I am having similar issues with trying to help set my Girlfriends New Iphone SE 2020 and transfer number over she not good at this stuff.

You need Internet/WiFi for App Store phone updates WiFi calls on whatsapp Imessage and FaceTime etc...

so once connected to WiFi she will have to go to the app store to download apps (Blue Square with white Triangle in the middle)

Dose your Friend have have Signal on her phone? if not she will have to restart her phone to get signal? Did she put sim in Sim Card Tray?

kah22

Thanks for the reply and I trust you are safe two. Her internet access will be coming via a community modem and I don’t know if it’s an open network or locked. Will have to get her to check.

At the number the no one issue is to get her out of that emergency calls onlysituations.  By the sounds of it all her old numbers are there, it’s just she can’t call them !  She’s no good at this stuff either and trying to do it from a distance doesn’t make it any easier 😁

Keep Safe

jon81uk

If they have an iPad they want to copy the Apps from they should have set up following the method here 
https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201269
But if they have already gone through set up, it might be easier to go into settings then general and erase everything and start again with setting up the phone from the iPad or iCloud, ensuring the WiFi password is entered at the right moment.
As a separate issue, if they are getting the emergency calls only notice then their SIM ay not be correct or they might not have a live service from the network, that is more likely to be an issue with the signal or the billing.

stragglebod

Has this been sorted now? 'Emergency calls only' means that the phone can find a network, but not one that she is a customer of. So in an emergency she can make a call using whatever network the phone can find but not for other reasons.

That could mean her signal is just rubbish, and she's just happened to receive calls when she's wandered back in range. Or it could be that the phone is locked to another network. Or that the sim activation hasn't worked properly. What have O2 said?

JJ_Egan

Recon then i would check the IMEI . could be wrong could be blocked > not sure how they work on I stuff though .

kah22

Thanks for your replies to date. Like is a !!!!!!. I’m in isolation because of age. The friend is living in a community where they use a common modem, that’s in the office so unless it’s an open network then I suppose she’ll have to wait until Monday
im assuming it is the correct sim. The guy on the o2 registered it and had it unlocked and it was a few hours before I could talk to her. 

To be honest unless it was a simple fix I guess she’ll have to take it to the nearby o2 shop when it opens. She hasn’t a clue and I’m certainly not going to mention the iPad to her. 

Life is a !!!!!!

GTR_King

Where did she get the phone from?? 
Is the iphone blacklisted??

Go to Settings-General-About then check the IEM Number online to see if the phone is blocked? 
If iphone is blocked then she won't be able to make calls/sent text messages and maybe even receive calls and the only why to unblock it is to contact the original owner...

Maybe her sim card is damaged or her network restricted her usage or she run out of minutes etc 


If we’d barred you from making calls, we’d have told you why. So make sure you haven't added call barring by mistake. If you haven't, call us on 0800 230 0202 and we'll sort it out. We're open all hours. best to call o2 if phone not blocked as they might have barred her from making calls