How to send emergency calls from a blocked VoIP account

A prepaid balance, a credit limit, and a user marked Blocked exist to stop calls. 999 and 112 are calls, so the same checks stop them.

Operators who sell voice to businesses or to homes run this on MOR, the Class 5 switch: white-label and hosted PBX providers, and ISPs that add voice. The caller is a person or a PBX dialing a short code. A wholesale Class 4 trunk, and an outbound-only dialer, have no such caller. You need a provider that accepts the emergency number and completes the call. MOR has no switch that ignores a blocked account, an empty balance, or Daily Balance Limit. These steps do not send the caller’s location.

Why a block stops 999

You turn on prepaid cut-off and Daily Balance Limit to stop spend. An empty prepaid balance, a postpaid credit ceiling, Daily Balance Limit (hangup cause 290), and a user marked Blocked stop 999.

In the UK, General Condition A3 (unofficial consolidation, in effect from 8 April 2026) requires uninterrupted access to the emergency organisations (A3.2(b)) and 999 and 112 at no charge (A3.4). A3.5 requires caller location where that is feasible. A3.3 requires a plain-English warning, on VoIP outbound service sold to consumers, micro and small enterprises, and not-for-profit customers, that a power cut or an internet failure can stop the call. Read A3. This page is the MOR routing. It is not a legal opinion, and it does not send location or that warning.

Openreach closes the copper network on 31 January 2027. In October 2026 about one million copper lines were left, about 300,000 at business sites, and on 1 October 2026 the 2025 WLR rental doubled. Voice that moves takes emergency calling with it. A missed date can put the line on EVAc, a temporary service for essential calls. Openreach, October 2026.

On 25 September 2025 Ofcom fined Vonage £700,000. A software update stopped 999 and 112 on UK business desk phones from 23 October to 3 November 2023. Vonage ran no emergency test after the update, and its monitoring missed the outage. The decision cites A3.2(b). On a smaller switch that gap is one routing change and no test after it. A compliance programme opened on 31 October 2025. The 8 June 2026 letter asks for an alert on an emergency-call outage, because a general network alarm can miss one, and for a test booked with BT’s 999 Call Handling Centre so the test stays off the live service. Location and address data in that letter sit outside this guide.

What you set up first

• A provider that accepts the emergency number. SETTINGS → Billing → Providers.
• An LCR that contains that provider, so the call leaves the caller’s normal outbound route. SETTINGS → Routing → LCR.
• A user tariff and a provider tariff for the number you send after the rewrite, not for the digits the handset dialed. SETTINGS → Billing → Tariffs.
• An emergency user. SETTINGS → Users. Turn Blocked off, give the user balance or credit, and turn Daily Balance Limit off. If that user sits under a reseller or a partner, edit that account the same way. Create a device for this user.
• One Location per dialing pattern. One device holds one Location. Two sites that must send two different numbers need two Locations.

The API method location_rule_create creates the same destination rule. device_update sets the device Location.

Send 999 and 112 on their own route

Open SETTINGS → Billing → Functions → Localization. Add one row under Destination rules for each short code.

MOR stores the finished number in Add. It does not build that number from an area code during the call.

Assign the Location on each calling device. SETTINGS → Users → Devices, field Location.

If 112 matches a prefix you sell, set the device row to Cut 112, Add 00112, length 3. Set the provider Location to Cut 00112, Add 112, length 5. Call Tracing has to show 112 on the provider leg, and the original user’s invoice shows 00112. Use a prefix the tariff does not sell. With no clash, Cut and Add are both 112 and the provider Location leaves the number as it is.

Let the call through when the account cannot pay

Change User Tariff keeps the same user, so a block and Daily Balance Limit stay with that user. Use it when the caller can pay and this call needs a different price. Leave it empty when the emergency user takes the call.

Change Call’s owner is the field that completes the call. Select the emergency device. MOR bills the emergency user, so the end user’s invoice omits the call. The emergency user’s tariff has to rate the number you send.

A 0-rate tariff passes an empty balance when three conditions hold: zero-cost calls are allowed with an empty balance, Connection Fee is 0, and the tariff type is not By Provider. That path leaves a block in place, and Daily Balance Limit on that user applies. A blocked account, or an account over its daily cap, needs Change Call’s owner.

Send the right calling number

Leave CallerID empty on the emergency device when the provider must receive the original caller’s number. A CallerID filled in on that device replaces it. The field sits in the device CallerID section.

Emergency CallerID, and Emergency CallerID Number Pool, replace the presented number when the destination after localization sits in the pool. MOR writes that same number into P-Asserted-Identity and Remote-Party-ID. Put the rewritten number in the pool. A rule that turns 112 into 00112 matches 00112, not 112. In Australia, after country code 61 is added, the pool matches 61000, not 000.

A block, an empty balance, and Daily Balance Limit stay in force. In March 2025 a UK admin with two trunks could not make the emergency route present each trunk’s caller ID. The thread is that caller-ID problem. Emergency CallerID on MOR sets the presented number and leaves the block in place.

Three dialing patterns

United Kingdom and Ireland

Dial 999 or 112 and use the table: Cut and Add are that code, length 3, unless the clash case uses 00112. Ireland dials the same codes. The Ofcom paragraphs above are UK law.

Australia

Add one Destination rules row for 000, one for 106, and one for 112. Cut and Add are that code, length 3. Change Call’s owner is the emergency device. Change User LCR is the emergency LCR. The call has to complete from a blocked account, an empty balance, or an account over Daily Balance Limit.

If prelocalization added 61, the device Location matches 61000, 61106, and 61112. Prelocalization applies Cut, Add, and length. Put Change Call’s owner on the device Location, which runs after prelocalization. The emergency user’s tariff rates the number you send, 000 or 61000. Keep 000, 106, 112, 61000, 61106, and 61112 off Blocked Numbers and off that user’s blocked destinations.

Poland

The handset dials 112. The provider receives a finished steering number, for example 48C710112. Store that string in Add. The letter C is part of the number you send.

Orange Polska Tabela 1, edition 9, maps municipalities onto 17 steering numbers, IDL 710. Shared numbers mean 17 Locations, not one per municipality. A customer in two areas gets two Locations, one on each device. Edition 9 has no IDL 100, so 48C100112 is not in that list. Confirm the current table before you load rules. A later edition can change it.

Tariffs match digits. A prefix that contains C is skipped. The digits in front of C are the prefix: 48 rates 48C710112. Put 48 on the emergency user tariff and on the emergency provider tariff.

On the provider Location, leave the leading 48 in place. Cutting 48 from 48C710112 sends C710112. This rule sets the called number from the device Location. GPS position and eCall data stay outside it.

Three ways the rewrite dies

MOR checks Blocked Numbers after the Location rule. The menu is SETTINGS → Security → Blocked Numbers, a system-admin list from MOR X11. MOR checks the billed user’s blocked destinations against that same rewritten number. A block on 61000 stops a call that started as 000. Keep the short code and every rewritten form off both lists.

The emergency provider has its own Location, under SETTINGS → Billing → Providers. A destination rule there runs after routing. Leave the emergency number as the device Location shaped it, apart from a technical prefix you added so you could remove it on purpose.

On Provider Rules, a Cut value of a hyphen sends the number the caller dialed and drops the device Location. A hyphen there turns 48C710112 back into 112, and 00112 back into 112.

Trace it, then place one real test call

Open SETTINGS → Billing → Functions → Call Tracing. Check three fields: the billed user is the emergency user, the number after localization is the number the provider must receive, and the provider is the emergency provider.

Call Tracing skips the user and device Call Limit, so a clean trace can sit beside a live call that stops on that limit. After every change, place one real test call from a device on that Location. In the UK, book it with BT’s 999 Call Handling Centre before you dial. Write down the date, the device, the dialed digits, the number after the rewrite, the provider, and the result. The note does not record caller location, and it is not a June 2026 filing. Repeat the test on each Location, including a second Polish area.

FAQ

Does Emergency CallerID let a blocked account call 999?

It sets the presented number when the rewritten destination is in the pool. The block, the empty balance, and Daily Balance Limit stay.

Will a zero price on 999 let a blocked user through?

A zero price can clear an empty balance under the three conditions above. A user marked Blocked stays blocked. That account needs Change Call’s owner.

Does this setup send the caller’s location?

The provider that receives the call has to supply location and address data. A3.5, A3.6, and the June 2026 letter treat that as a separate duty. The Location rule sets the called number, the LCR, and the billed user.

Does the same setup run on a wholesale switch?

These fields are on MOR. Carrier-to-carrier traffic belongs on the Class 4 product.

Call Tracing succeeds and the phone call fails. What do I check?

Call Limit, which the trace skips. Then Blocked Numbers on the rewritten number. Then the provider Location, and a hyphen in Provider Rules Cut.

Walk through it on your own switch

Pick one device, one short code, and one emergency user with credit and with Daily Balance Limit off. Run Call Tracing. Book one test call with the provider that accepts the number. To have someone read the Location row with you before you load it for a reseller, contact Kolmisoft and ask for a walkthrough of this emergency user and the destination rule.