QUIRK Anyone Using Level3?

[Stewart]

We have been in the process with Level 3 to migrate from a Bonded T-1 / PRI setup to a SIP setup for the last few months with one of our clients. They had TW telecom for 3 years beforehand and they kept promising that SIP trunks were around the corner and when Level 3 came along and said SIP was now supported over Fiber we became very excited.

We began this process some months ago, but every couple of weeks or so they come up with some new way to make things difficult for us, though. Things like putting the phone number at the wrong office and, instead of correcting it, set up RCFs to make it work. Or every cut sheet have the wrong phone numbers and/or IPs. Well, today they informed us that even though they support Asterisk 11.7 and newer they need us to change from a FreePBX to a Digium front-end because they only support a Digium front-end and aren't certified with FreePBX. We tried to tell them that means they support Digium systems and not Asterisk but they replied it should be a simple matter to switch and they are cancelling our order because our system isn't compatible. Has anyone ever heard of that? Anyone here using Level3 with their FreePBX-based system?

 

[hecatae]

Hi Stewart,

How did Level 3 discover you were using a FreePBX-based frontend, and do they support AsteriskNOW, the Digium FreePBX-Flavoured distro?

 

[Stewart]

When the engineer called to get our info we told them Asterisk 11.5. He said "No, what front-end are you using?" We replied FreePBX. That's how he found out. He specifically asked what the front-end was for Asterisk that we were using.

 

[lrosenman]

Why in heavens name do they care?

 

[hecatae]

Why in heavens name do they care?

exactly, it should make no difference.

 

[wardmundy]

Ironically, Digium's "front end" now is the FreePBX GUI with the Digium logo.

 

[Stewart]

We tried to tell them! Yes, Ward, I noticed that the interface was essentially FreePBX with their logo in the upper-left hand corner. They told us today that they will go forward with the install but won't offer any setup support since it's an "unsupported" platform. Where do they get these people!!!

 

[RonRussell]

We have two clients using L3 sip with FreePBX. One has been in place for over two years. The other for two months on TWT/L3. Both installs were a breeze and the service is solid.

 

[Stewart]

Thanks for the info Ron. Could you post a trunk config so I can get it pre-setup? At this point I'm not sure if I can trust their engineers to give me the right stuff. They keep wanting to convert the remote sites to come down the SIP trunk before moving us off of the PRI and onto the SIP trunk. They've tried scheduling it that way 3 times now and have scheduled a conference call for tomorrow because after so many months they still aren't sure what they're doing.

 

[RonRussell]

Stewart -
Here are configs for inbound and outbound of a system using L3 (not formerly TWT) sip.
This system does not use L3 transport (it is in a colo where L3 is one of the providers for the colo which is used for internet).
I will post the config for the formerly TWT L3 trunk tomorrow.

level3-inbound
type=friend
dtmfmode=rfc2833
host=(ip provided by L3)
port=5070
disallow=all
allow=ulaw
insecure=port,invite
qualify=yes
context=from-trunk

level3-outbound
type=friend
dtmfmode=rfc2833
host=(ip provided by L3)
port=5070
username="username"
trustrpid=yes
sendrpid=yes
secret="secret"
disallow=all
allow=ulaw
context=from-trunk
nat=no

 

[Stewart]

That's very different than what they gave me. The told me port=5060, that there is no username or secret, and that it's a proxy and needs no qualify. Their documentation also shows RTP ports are 20,000-39,999. Do you think that'll make a difference?

What they show me is:
[Inbound]
type=peer
context=qflex_in
host=(ip)

[outbound]
type-peer
outboundproxy=(ip)

 

[RonRussell]

I did not want to give trunk configs from my old memory for the formerly TWT L3 sip trunk but as I recall it is very simple.
TWT/L3 provided transport to the site with a connection to an isolated vlan on one of the existing customer switches with a unique ip subnet (ex:192.168.199.0).
The trunk configs were very similar to what you specified above other than the context.
I will be at that site tomorrow and can provide more detail.

 

[RonRussell]

On the server using TWT/L3 sip trunk we have this config for both inbound and outbound traffic

LVL3
host=192.168.33.1 (this is local ip for the TWT transport termination)
type=peer
qualify=yes

 

[Larry WArwick]

There are a few things to understand about Level 3. The company has acquired several other companies over the last 7 years. As they integrate the companies they are taking what they consider the best of breed and growing only those platforms.
If you were on the TW Telecom platform, that configuration will be very different than connecting to a Level 3 sip connection.
Now for some of the questions the techs would have asked.... and should have asked...
Knowing the type of PBX, and the version help in the provisioning process. Knowing what they are connecting to will isolate the automated provisioning to ensure test and turn up is highly successful.
The Asterisk/FreePBX model is supportable and trust me they have more than a handful on the network. You should have also been told because you are connecting over the internet that Authentication IS required, and failure to support authentication will mean they cannot support the service. This is for your protection, I have seen $150K fraud charges in less than 24 hours. Typically Level 3 will request you use UDP port 5070 for the SIP signalling, and create ACL's to allow only this port from the designated Peer IP. The RTP may come from different IP's and subsequently your ACL should also allow all port numbers through for RTP.

You should have also received a test and turn up document which would have isolated any issues with the configuration. If these services were purchased through a former TWT person, they may have not understood the process, and should help you engage with the activations team to ensure the turn up is completed appropriately.