Whats going on with his phone??

Question

Ive been calling my friend and when i call it rings and then i get this message saying (the subscriber you are attempting to reach is unavailable at this moment please try again later) ... I would usually get his voicemail if he didnt answer.. o and if it rings does he actually see if i called or not on his celle IF its closed?? I called him last night ona private number and he answered.. but a little early on i tried the private number and still got the same message??

Answer 1

It's not uncommon.   See, cell phone have what's called autonomous registration.  They send out occasional beacon signals to the cell sites telling the site, "hey I'm still out here".  If the phone is out of range, off or the nearest cell site is down, then when you try to call and the sites transmit their aknowledge request and his phone doesn't respond, then you get the "subscriber unavailable" message.

On my service, the message is in both english & Spanish and my dad assumes I'm in Mexico or something when he hears the spanish message...