Lumia 520 Wifi Tethering (Internet Sharing) and Cyan 8.1 Update

[emmiss]

Hello. I was on the developer preview and just received the final 8.1 Update (8.10.14176.243)

All is well EXCEPT my Internet Sharing is no longer functioning. The error is, "Connection not shared". To enable tethering on this device, go to h**p://att..com/mywireless or dial 611.

I have had this feature enabled on my phone for the past ten years and only after this push, did it become disabled. I have opened a case with ATT and they said that a few people have also reported this to be the case. They do not know if a fix is going to become available.

Has anyone else experienced this on the Lumia 520? Does anyone have a workaround?

 

[PiggyMiddle]

That's usually the APN or SIM is not correct for the sharing. Mine did not change after the Cyan update, but I was not on the developer version.
Try
Settings
Cellular and SIM
SIM Settings.

Turn off automatic - then set the appropriate URL (add internet APN) for Internet access. You may have to get that URL from your carrier.

 

[rhapdog]

I had the same issue with my 520 after the Cyan update. I also have AT&T as the carrier.
After about a week of going back and forth with AT&T tech support, I finally insisted that they "disable" the tethering from my account, then "re-enable" it. I told them that I felt it would work like a "reboot" and perhaps get it to work again. It did. Haven't had a bit of trouble since.

It took a lot of doing to find someone that understood what I was talking about to get them to try it, but someone figured out what I meant, and got it working for me.

Turns out, it wasn't something on my phone, per se, but an issue between my phone and the carrier where it wasn't being recognized. AT&T just needed to reset their end of it before it started working again.

May or may not be the same with yours, but definitely worth a shot.

 

[emmiss]

thanks for the replies but non of them worked for me.

anyone else?

 

[ericcoxtcu]

We are having the same problem on both of our sons' 520s. Nothing from AT&T has worked. We were also running developer preview.

 

[littlehoov]

I'm having the very same issue, extremely frustrated as this was one of the main reasons I bought the phone just a few days ago. Needed the wifi hotspot feature. Worked great for the day or two I had it before I went to 8.1.

Ive called AT&T twice. The first time they told me to call Nokia, which I havent done yet. The second time they told me that the 8.1 app disabled the internet sharing on GoPhones, whether or not you were using it with a rate plan. Dont know if thats true, but she sounded convincing.

Ridiculous...a feature thats been common on phones for 5+ years and Microsoft/ Nokia cant get it right.

Anyone have a solution to this besides buying another phone? I tried downgrading via the Nokia software, but it only offered me the same software I already had.

 

[littlehoov]

Fixed! After an hour or so on the phone with ATT...

Ill try to summarize what I was told.

I have a mobileshare plan, the type of feature set their system was giving me, based on my Lumia 520 did not have provisions for using a wifi hotspot, or for using visual voicemail for that matter (an issue that just started today).

Advanced tech support basically tricked their system somehow into thinking that I have an Iphone, which does of course have those features. Since doing so everything works great!

Happy to have this resolved at least for me, and maybe someone else can benefit from it. Advanced tech support is so much better at these kinds of things, its just a matter of getting to talk to them to start with.

 

[rhapdog]

Fixed! After an hour or so on the phone with ATT...

Ill try to summarize what I was told.

I have a mobileshare plan, the type of feature set their system was giving me, based on my Lumia 520 did not have provisions for using a wifi hotspot, or for using visual voicemail for that matter (an issue that just started today).

Advanced tech support basically tricked their system somehow into thinking that I have an Iphone, which does of course have those features. Since doing so everything works great!

Happy to have this resolved at least for me, and maybe someone else can benefit from it. Advanced tech support is so much better at these kinds of things, its just a matter of getting to talk to them to start with.

Thanks for the info about how you got it handled.

I was told by ATT Advanced Tech support that this is a known issue with the L520, and that the only workaround is a "temporary fix", and that it will eventually recur. My issue did recur again a couple of weeks ago, and will do so again, as I'm sure everyone else's will as well.

I also have a mobileshare plan. As far as Visual Voicemail goes, I have no idea if that works or not, because my 520 doesn't even have Visual Voicemail on it to be able to try to access it. I haven't figured that one out yet, because I only discovered earlier this morning that Visual Voicemail even exists, as this is my first smart phone. I'll have to call AT&T back about that one, I suppose.

 

[fdalbor]

As a 520 owner (and three other windows phones), the thing that controls most of these functions (hot spot, text pictures etc) is the APR setting on the phone. Even if you have the settings right on your phone, the carrier has to have the same setting in their data base for your phone. I recently changed from AT&T to Consumer Cellular and went through this problem with four phones (3 win and a Moto G lte). After hours on the phone and a boat load of emails we managed to get three working; but one is still not right. From what I can tell the APR settings are saved on your sim card (according to AT&T) so if you get a new phone and move your sim into it they might not match and you are back at square one. Most things will work; but the items controled by the APR settings are a crap shoot. The one good thing about AT&T their people will work with you to get it riight even if it takes hours. So why did I change, I am saving 75$ a month with CC over AT&T and CC lets your use AT&T phones and AT&T's network.

 

[grobinsonpa]

Hello, I also have a 520 on CC. Did you get the tethering to work? If so, did you have to change any settings in the phone? Thanks

 

[fdalbor]

Got cellular data to work and MMS to work but not tethering. It keeps saying you have to call AT&T (which I am not on anymore) 611 to get tethering to work. I did get tethering to work on my Moto G with the settings I got from CC but as they do not sell Windows phones they have not put alot of effort into getting the correct settings. They do sell the Moto G so they gave me the settings from their Moto G and they worked fine except for LTE. I must also say the Moto g they sell does not have lte so they had no setting to fix that. They are very limited in the phones they sell and I doubt we will ever see a Windows phone (though the 635 or 535 would be perfect) on CC. But for 75$ less a month for three phones I can live without a few features.

 

[teddystiles]

Same problem. Son broke my 920, so I dropped the SIM into a 520 while I wait for the next flagship (2 years is unacceptable, for the record).

Initially, everything worked great (internet sharing and visual voicemail). A few days later, I realized nobody was leaving me new voicemails. Since visual voicemail wasn't working, I dialed in and the system told me my voicemail didn't exist. I called customer service, and the guy said that somehow switching devices deactivated my voicemail, and he activated it again. He also said, "I see you're using a Lumia 520," which I thought nothing of at the time. After he "fixed" the voicemail, both my VV disappeared and internet sharing stopped working.

I'm guessing that VM got turned off when the system realized I was on a 520, and at that point it disabled both VV and internet sharing as well.

What should have been a simple chat to AT&T tech support asking them to tell the system that I have a 920 instead of a 520 resulted in visual voicemail back, but still no tethering. I'm hoping that their provisioning/propagation takes a while, and that it will start working again soon!

 

[teddystiles]

Any word on this? Still struggling. Perhaps it's an APN issue? I remember changing APNs to get tethering working way back on my HTC Tilt. I was able to tether on 3G. Why in the world does AT&T reserve this feature for LTE?!? 4G tethering worked fine until it didn't.

Anyway, I see APN settings under Settings > Cellular and SIM and under Settings > Access Point. Does anyone know what changes I could try to make to get things working again?

 

[rhapdog]

Tethering isn't reserved for LTE. It is available for the 520 on 4G, but there is a firmware issue with the 520 that causes problems when combined with AT&T's network.

Basically, what AT&T has to do to fix the issue, is lie to the system and tell it you have a different phone, and it will work. (Okay, they specifically tell their system you have an iPhone, but don't get offended. It works for some strange reason.) Ever so often, their system reaches out to your phone to verify what you are using. When this happens, it will reset and you will have to call AT&T back and get the "fix" again.

AT&T can fix this, but you have to talk to them to get it done. There is no setting you can do on your end to fix it. It has to do with an issue between the 520 firmware and the AT&T systems.

I was able to permanently fix the issue by upgrading to the 635, but that may not be for everyone.