Your name please…

One of the woes we voice engineers deal with on nearly every deployment is the compelling need users have to not only see the calling number of the individual bothering them via telephone, but also the name.  I assume this is so they can add the names of the really annoying callers to a list that gets mailed to the North Pole every December.  (hey, those telemarketers deserve that coal they get in their stockings, no question about it…)

While every deployment is different and I am far too lazy to outline every possible configuration for calling name to show up for users, I will highlight the importance of the command set below being in the router configuration if you are dealing with H323 gateways, calling name is being delivered in the Facility IE, and your inbound calling name isn’t being displayed on the phone*:

voice service voip
h323
h225 display-ie ccm-compatible

How will you know you need this command set?

Well, let’s say you’ve done your due diligence and confirmed with the carrier that calling name *is* being sent. Please don’t skip this step, you will beat your head against your desk until unconscious when you find you’ve been troubleshooting a calling name issue for days and the customer never ordered the service on the line.

Let’s say you have also confirmed, with my favorite debug of all time debug isdn q931, that you are seeing calling name in the debug.  In some cases, like the one we are discussing, calling name may be coming in the Facility IE, and you should see it clearly in the debug**.  It will look something like this:

RX <- FACILITY pd = 8  callref = 0x018C
Facility i = 0x9F8B0100A117020101020100800F41524E4F4C4420414D592020202020
Protocol Profile =  Networking Extensions
0xA117020101020100800F41524E4F4C4420414D592020202020
Component = Invoke component
Invoke Id = 1
Operation = CallingName
Name Presentation Allowed Extended
Name = AMY

Typically if you have gotten this far and your inbound calling name is still not showing, you are nearly there.  Adding the aforementioned h225 display-ie ccm-compatible command should do the trick.

Note that if you are dealing with a gateway running really old IOS, you may not see this command available.  You’ve got to be on at least version 12.4(20)T or else you will be one sad panda. Once you enter these commands, you’ll not only see calling name in the debugs, but your customer should see it on the phone as well and think you are a miracle worker, as we voice engineers often are.

*If you love yourself you’ll be dealing with H323 voice gateways and not MGCP. MGCP, however, does have some nifty check boxes to get  Facility IE calling name working – however, that remains material for another blog post.

**If you don’t see calling name in the debug, then you likely need to enter a few commands to make the Facility IE delivery work. Your serial interface should look something like this:

interface Serial0/0/0:23
no ip address
encapsulation hdlc
isdn switch-type primary-ni
isdn incoming-voice voice
isdn supp-service name calling
isdn outgoing display-ie

Try the above commands if you are seeing something like the debug output below. Also be certain that your switch type supports Facility IE, not all switch types do. On a related note, switch type must be agreed upon between yourself and the carrier, don’t believe you can change one end and the other end will just work. It’s voice mind you, rarely do things just *work*…

Facility i = 0x9F8B0100A11D02010106042B0C0900801254656C65547261636B204F7574626F756E64
Protocol Profile =  Networking Extensions
0xA11D02010106042B0C0900801254656C65547261636B204F7574626F756E64
Component = Invoke component, Unsupported operation

***Additional FWIW – I recently did an upgrade from 6.1 to 8.6 and inbound calling name wasn’t a problem on 6.1 without the ccm-compatible command, but after the upgrade calling name only worked with this command added. I also found this link from 2010 to helpful when troubleshooting this type of issue: https://supportforums.cisco.com/docs/DOC-8873

Published March 3/26/2013