Why do I hear a stuttered dial tone on my phone when I pick it up to make a call?

[blue2013]

Every time I pick up my phone the dial tone sounds like a stutter for a few seconds then returns to normal. Why does it do that?

[SadathCS · Accepted solution]

The stuttered dial tone is your message waiting indicator letting you know you have an unheard message. If you do not use the U-verse voicemail you need to enable your voicemail to delete any messages that are in your mailbox that you may not have been aware of then disable your voicemail again. For more information refer to Message Waiting Indicator

[gmsuv]

Yea!  

I finally got rid of my dial tone issue also after 2 months of beep, beep, beep , and finally a dial tone.

Thanks for the info.  I thought I had a line problem.

[JHJHJH]

I have made three phone calls and spent more than one hour on the phone with AT&T Tech Support to try to get rid of stutter dial tones on my two AT&T U-verse VOIP landlines, but it continues today.  The stutter dial tone appeared by itself several weeks ago.  I do not use, and have never used, AT&T U-verse voicemail.  This is a minor annoyance, but it's getting pretty irritating.  I'm now writing an Email message to AT&T (if I can find an address to which to send it) describing the situation and requesting that it be fixed.    

[aviewer]

@JHJHJH - The stutter dial tone indicates a Voice mail, including a welcome message for VM. Dial *98 & listen to the messages. If you do not want to use VM after that  ask for it to be turned off.

[JHJHJH]

After having spent more than two hours on the phone with AT&T Customer Service trying to get rid of the stutter dial tone (which signals a message waiting on AT&T's voicemail service, which I do not use), they finally gave up and sent a tech out my house to "check my phone installation."  He fixed the problem in 30 seconds by dialing something on the phone.  

[Meh_67]

I have the same stutter dial tone when I pick up my phone. I have NO voicemails (i have deleted all of them) and I have no missed calls (i removed them as well) - but this ridiculous stutter (it does it like 10 times) will not go away.

Again, I have NO voicemail messages at all - but it still does it.

[spoom2]

If you're using U-verse go into your phone portal and see what it says.  Sometimes it takes a bit for the notification to go away. 

[Meh_67]

I am not using U-verse.
I have cox cable and the phone is connected to the cox cable phone box.

[spoom2]

Than you have to call your phone provider, it's not coming from the phone it's coming from the provider.  

[Meh_67]

Got it - thanks and have a great day.