Forum Discussion

hdshortz's avatar
hdshortz
Network Novice
Hace 6 meses

Phone is intermittently switching to "Emergency Calls Only"

I had a Samsung Galaxy S20+.  It had worked properly until a month or two ago, when I noticed the phone would intermittently leave the T-Mobile network and only allow Emergency Calls.  I was unable to receive or make calls and texts during those periods, which could last for 20-30 minutes at a time.  Since I was due for an upgrade, I assumed that switching to a new phone would resolve the issue.  I got a Galaxy Z Flip5. 

I migrated my data over from the old phone using Smart Switch, and noticed that the problem was occurring on my new phone.  So I backed up everything on Samsung Cloud, performed a factory reset on the new phone, and restored the data (minus the settings, since I thought there might be a rogue setting causing this).  This did not resolve the issue.  I did another factory reset and deleted the e-sim, in the event that something in the SIM card was causing the issue.  I replaced it with a physical SIM.  No change. 

After the last factory reset, I restored everything from Samsung Cloud and then reset the mobile network settings.  No change.  I verified that there were no system updates available.  I disabled 2G on the phone, as the T-Mobile reps suggested there could be a conflict between 5G and 2G.  No change. 

In the access point names, I've verified that the APN is correct (fast.t-mobile.com - I'm in the US).  In the Network Operators section, it is set to Select Automatically.  I turned that off and attempted to register on T-Mobile, which works.  But after a while the phone goes back to only allowing emergency calls. 

This happens everywhere I go, so it doesn't appear to be signal issue.  My wife is not experiencing this issue with her phone, so it appears to be restricted to my phone/account in some way.  I'm at a loss as to how to proceed.
 

  • hdshortz's avatar
    hdshortz
    Network Novice

    After a day of just using 4G I have not had any service interruptions.  I would have had multiple interruptions by this point. 5G seems to be the cause, but I'm not sure why since my wife's phone (on the same account, in the same location, using 5G) is not affected. I'll just leave 5G off for the time being.  Hopefully this helps someone else if they run into the same problem. 

  • hdshortz's avatar
    hdshortz
    Network Novice

    I’ve noted a few posts about 5G causing issues, so I’ll disable that for now and see it the issue persists on 4G.