Address:
896 Old Knoxville Highway
Sevierville, TN 37862
Phone:
865-453-4668
To get started you must first open an account with GTL Connect Network (aka Viapath Technologies)
There are dozens of third-party for profit companies working with Sevier County Jail Annex and other jails in Tennessee to provide a way for inmates to phone friends and families at rates that are much less than what jails have been known to charge in the past.
The lower rates come at a cost to inmates though, as most of the profit from these calls pay for other benefits such as television and both indoor and outdoor recreational services from board games to sports and workout equipment.
To find out what phone service is being used for inmates housed in Sevier County, call 865-453-4668, or if the phone service is not noted above, click on one of these companies below, each of which provide service for jails in the state of Tennessee:
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How to get phone Calls from your inmate at Sevier County Jail Annex
PRE-PAYING
Using GTL you have the option of either:
- pre-paying directly into your inmate's account where they decide who to call, or
- pre-paying, where you control all phone costs and all calls come only to you.
Prepaid Option #1
If you deposit money online in the INMATE ACCOUNT, than they have the freedom to spend the money on phone calls to anyone, or any other communications services available at Sevier County Jail Annex.
Prepaid Option #2
With the FRIENDS & FAMILY ACCOUNT, you control all communication services such as phone calls, video visits and messaging. Your inmate can only call the phone number you want.
No, you cannot call an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex. You can however call 865-453-4668, or search online to see if your inmate is in custody.
When an offender is first arrested and is being booked into jail, they are allowed one or two free phone calls to notify friends or family of their situation. If they are unable to notify someone at that point, they can try again, this time it will be a collect call that you will have to pay for if your phone service allows you to receive collect calls, once they are classified, processed, dressed and brought to their unit.
However, if the phone they call is a cell phone, which normally do not allow the receipt of collect calls, or your phone service does not allow for collect calls, then you will not be able to receive any phone calls from them until you purchase phone credits from the Sevier County Jail Annex’s inmate calling system.
The information for this is located above, at the top of this page. If that information is missing, it is because the facility recently changed companies and you can get the details by calling 865-453-4668.
It is rare that a jail (or prison) will accept messages for an inmate. Of all the thousands of jails in the United States there are probably less than one hundred that have a message line.
There are two exceptions to this rule:
1. Sevier County Jail Annex will accept a message if there is a family emergency such as a death in the family. In a case like this the message will be conveyed by a jail chaplain or someone that is very high ranking in leadership. Inmates are already under a lot of stress and emotion, and the staff realizes this. It is for this reason they will be very careful how they pass the message along and being watchful afterwards.
2. Many of the inmate phone systems used by jails allow for messages to be left for a small fee, usually less than $1.00 for a minute. It is done in the form of a voicemail from you. To see if Sevier County Jail Annex offers that service call the phone company at the top of this page or call the jail at 865-453-4668.
Yes, an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex can call you using any of the following three ways:
1. The inmate can call you ‘collect’ if your phone service accepts collect calls.
2. The inmate can call you using a prepaid calling card that they can purchase from the jail’s inmate commissary.
3. The inmate can call you using credits or money that you or someone else purchases from the jail’s inmate phone service. This information can be found at the top of this page.
If you can’t find the jail’s phone service, it means that they may have recently changed it. Call the jail at 865-453-4668 to get the information you need.
Also, it is becoming standard that when an inmate is booked in jail, they must make a list of a limited number of people that they will allow to visit them and/or make phone calls to. If the Sevier County Jail Annex requires this, then you will have to be on their list to receive phone calls.
Yes. If a person is on the inmate’s approved phone contact list and the person accepts a collect call or the inmate has funds on their prepaid card or phone account, there are no restrictions based on whether the person and inmate are related or not.
The only exception to that is if you, as the person who funds their inmate phone account, puts restrictions on the account, so that the account can only be used to communicate with you and not other people. This allows you and not the Sevier County Jail Annex to control who the inmate can speak with.
When you receive a collect call from a jail, you will first hear a recording that the call is a collect call and coming from a jail and the person’s spoken name. You will then be asked to respond with a prompt or by voicing “yes” that you agree to accept the call. At that point you can either accept it or refuse it.
If you continue to get calls from the jail and don’t want to receive them anymore, you can contact your phone service and request that that number be blocked.
The cost of a collect call is the most expensive call that you can make (or take). In fact, the cost (per minute) for a collect call can exceed the cost of an international call.
Expect to pay about $1.00 to 1.50 per minute for a collect call. Compared to the cost of a call going through the inmate phone service that the jail contracts with, ‘collect calls’ can be five to ten times more expensive.
If you are having difficulties receiving collect calls from the Sevier County Jail Annex contact your own phone service. Keep in mind that your land line service provider is not the same as your sell service provider.
The federal government limits the cost of a phone call from a jail in the United States to $0.21 per minute. This is true whether the inmate is using a prepaid card or one of their friends or family members have contracted with a phone service that the jail recommends.
In general, most of these companies are honest and trustworthy. The complete list can be found by scrolling down this page further.
There are independent companies that you can find and purchase phone time from that have fees as low as $0.05 to $0.10 per minute. They usually accomplish this by selling you blocks of time that you may never use, or they have exorbitant fees in other areas. Be a smart consumer and study these offers carefully.
In general, inmates in the Sevier County Jail Annex can make phone calls between the time when breakfast ends until ‘lights out’ at the end of the evening.
They will not allow phone calls to be made during meals, head counts or during shift changes.
Inmates who are workers (trustees), are on work release or have other responsibilities are also limited to when they can make phone calls, as their schedules take priority over personal time.
In general, other than during the scheduled events noted above, you can communicate by phone between the hours of 7:30AM and 10:00PM.
There is no limit to how often an inmate can make phone calls. They are limited only by how much money you are willing to give them to add phone time.
When and if there are limits, the limits never apply to phone time with their lawyer or legal matters related to their criminal court case.
There are some jails and prisons that limit how much an inmate can spend on phone calls, specifically inmates in the United States Bureau of Prisons, which limits federal prisoners to a $300 spend every month.
The inmate telephone service for this facility can be found at the top of this page. If the information is missing that means that the facility recently changed carriers and has not updated the information. In that case, call the jail at 865-453-4668 to get the answers to your questions.
Each of these phone companies provide similar services, and each cannot charge more than $0.021 per minute for domestic calls, however it is a very competitive industry due to the size of the market in which their customers are literally ‘captive’ in every sense of the word.
Amtel Phones
CIDNET
City Tele Coin
Correct Solutions Group
Correct Pay
Ctel
Gettingout
GTL
Homewav
ICSolutions
Inmate Canteen
Inmate Sales
Lattice (nexus telephone)
NCIC
Paytel
Prodigy Solutions
Reliance
Securus
Smart Communications
Tiger
No. Inmates in the Sevier County Jail Annex cannot text from the phones, but more and more jails are bringing in a text service for inmates that can work from kiosks and tablets in their units. For more information, check out this jail’s email and text page.
Almost every jail gives inmates and their contacts to either purchase calling cards from commissary or buy phone credits and time online from a phone service. There remain a few jails that still only allow collect calls which is an unfair financial burden on inmates and their families.
To see if Sevier County Jail Annex allows the purchase of phone cards, check the information at the top of this page or call the jail at 865-453-4668.
There is no limit to how often an inmate can make phone calls. They are limited only by how much money you are willing to give them to add phone time.
There are some jails and prisons that limit how much an inmate can spend on phone calls, specifically inmates in the United States Bureau of Prisons, which limits federal prisoners to a $300 spend every month, however during the holiday months that number is increased to $400 per month.
Of the dozens of phone companies listed above that do business with the jails and prisons, there are only a few that have a way for you to use cash to purchase phone credits or phone time from them, usually in an ATM machine at check cashing outlets, and only a couple that have a way for you to fund an inmate phone account by mailing them a money order or cashier check.
If you don’t have a credit or debit card from a bank, you can always get a prepaid one at thousands of check cashing locations across the country.
Most jails also have a way for inmates to purchase prepaid phone cards from their commissary. These jails usually allow the inmate’s trust account to be funded with postal money orders, negating the need for having a credit or debit card altogether.
Call 865-453-4668 to see if your Sevier County Jail Annex’s commissary has prepaid phone cards.
A video call is no different than a video visit. It allows both the inmate and their approved contacts to see each other during the conversation. This is becoming the preferred method for inmates and their friends and family members to communicate, as visual contact communicates on a different level than just the voice.
Jails and prisons that have the option of video calls and video visits also most likely have handheld tablets for inmate use. This gives the inmate the ability to communicate from their cell or a remote corner of the unit, which adds a level of privacy that a kiosk on the wall does not offer.
To see if Sevier County Jail Annex offers video calls, go to the top of this page or the Visitation page for information. If you can’t find it there, it may be because this facility recently changed companies, so you can call them at 865-453-4668 for details on how to arrange video calls.
No, they cannot use their cell phone.
Inmates have their cell phones taken from them when they are initially booked into jail and will not get them back until they are released, provided the phone is/was not kept by the arresting agency as evidence in a criminal investigation.
Cell phones are considered contraband and a security risk to a jail or prison. All communication: Written, spoken or video, other than an inmate’s communication with their lawyer, are monitored by the facility.
If an inmate is caught with a cell phone that has somehow been smuggled into a jail, the inmate will be charged with a crime. It is considered more serious than being caught with drugs, as a cell phone can be used to intimidate potential witnesses, arrange an escape or run a criminal enterprise outside of the jail’s walls.
It is unlikely that you can get charged with a crime for communicating with an inmate using a cell phone while incarcerated in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
That said, if it is found that you knowingly were doing it, you could have your visitation or phone privileges suspended, or even permanently terminated by the jail.
If you were involved in the smuggling of the phone, that is a criminal offense, as it may be if you were adding ‘minutes’ onto a prepaid phone that you knew was smuggled into the jail and was being used for illegal purposes.
Can you send email to an inmate in Sevier County Jail Annex?
City Telecoin also has a secure messaging service that allows you and your inmate to send and receive messages electronically (after being read by the jail).
Check to see if Sevier County Jail Annex has begun allowing this servce as well.
What are the most important things to know about phone calls with Inmates
If you were unable to find the information you were looking for on this page, call GTL Connect Network at 877-650-4249 and ask their policies on getting phone calls from your inmate at Sevier County Jail Annex.
You can contact GTL online by using this online form to ask a question.
The Sevier County Jail Annex contracts with City Tele Coin, the same company that offers Phone and Video Calling, to allow inmates to send and receive digital text messages from friends and loved ones.
You may have to provide them the funds to rent a tablet for a small monthly fee to do this, and of course there is a fee to send and receive messages.
To register for text and email digital message with your inmate go to City Tele Coin and sign up.
Customer Service Contact information:
[email protected]
318-746-1114
City Tele Coin is the same company that handles the inmate phone system, video visitations, email and texting and digital letters.
The tablets can be rented or used on a monthly basis and while not directly connected to the internet, the inmates can use them for the following activities:
Here's how it works:
Questions:
Follow these instructions on how to open an account with GTL Connect Network (aka Viapath Technologies)
For full instructions on the Sevier County Jail Annex Inmate Phone System, what the costs are, how it works, and tips and guidelines on rules, regulations and saving money on calls, check out our Inmate Phones Page.
To register and sign up for a remote visitation account with City Tele Coin to communicate with your Sevier County Jail Annex inmate, follow the instructions below:
For all the information you need to know, including instructions, policies, tips and solutions to possible issues regarding visiting with an inmate (both at the jail and remotely) in Sevier County, visit our full page guide.
NOTE: All video visits are recorded and stored. Whatever you talk about, can and will be used against your inmate in court. Never discuss their pending criminal case!
Also, be warned that some video visits providers are collecting voice prints for a database which law enforcement agencies are building.
To send commissary money to an inmate in Sevier County Jail Annex follow these steps:
For all information on how to Send Money to an inmate's account, what the fees are, how long it takes to hit their account and more, check out our full money and commissary guide for Sevier County Jail Annex.
How do I open an inmate phone account at the Sevier County Jail Annex?
The Sevier County Jail Annex uses a third-party phone service called GTL Connect Network. If you want to communicate by phone with your inmate, you have to first open an account with GTL. They have three different types of accounts: (1)AdvancePay - which is a prepaid collect calling service which allows an inmate to call your phone number using funds that you deposit. (2)PIN Debit - which allows an inmate to call direct to anyone they choose using money that you have deposited for them, or they can use money from their commissary or trust account to purchase prepaid phone credits. (3)Inmate Voicemail - In order to leave a voicemail for your inmate you must have an active AdvancePay Account. To leave a voicemail message you will call a local number that Sevier County Jail Annex has set up, select their Inmate ID, then record the message you want to leave them. To find out the phone number you call to leave a message, call Sevier County Jail Annex at 865-453-4668 or call GTL Connect Network at 877-650-4249. Learn more about how to get phone calls from an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
How much does it cost for an inmate to make a phone call from the Sevier County Jail Annex?
Phone call rates from your inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex to you vary and are subject to change, but in general the costs are as follows: AdvancePay Phone Calls - $0.21 per minute. PIN Debit Phone Calls - $0.21 per minute. Traditional Collect Phone Calls - $0.25 per minute. VOICEMAIL Message (one minute max) - $1.00 per minute. Learn more about how much phone calls cost in the Sevier County Jail Annex, or call GTL Connect Network at 877-650-4249.
Can inmate phone calls from the Sevier County Jail Annex connect to my mobile phone number?
Yes. When an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex calls you using a GTL Connect Network phone service's AdvancePay or PIN Debit account, the calls can connect to your cell phone. Learn more about how to set up a phone account for an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
Why is my Sevier County Jail Annex phone status blocked?
If your phone status at the Sevier County Jail Annex is showing being BLOCKED, there could be several reasons for this: (1)There are not enough funds on your AdvancePay or PIN Debit Account, (2)You have a new telephone number, and a restriction could be on your line, (3)You may have accidentally pressed the incorrect number when attempting to accept the incoming call and you may have blocked your line, (4)In the past you may have requested to have a block placed on your phone and you never had it removed. On any of these issues of your phone being blocked, you can resolve them by calling GTL Connect Network at 877-650-4249. Learn more about how to unblock a phone in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
Are phone calls with an inmate at the Sevier County Jail Annex recorded?
Yes. All phone calls with an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex are recorded. All calls except those with their lawyer. Everything you say and do are going to be heard and recorded by the jail staff. If you discuss your inmate's pending criminal case or any criminal activity, you can be assured that the conversation will end up being sent to the prosecutor and/or other law enforcement. Learn more about inmate phone calling privacy tips with an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
How do I control all phone calls with an inmate in Sevier County Jail Annex?
In order to have full control over the phone expenses and who your inmate can call while in the Sevier County Jail Annex, you need to open a GTL AdvancePay phone account. With this type of account, when you deposit money, your inmate can only call your phone number. However, since your inmate can also purchase prepaid phone time through commissary, they can use the prepaid account to phone whoever they choose, as long as the person or number is not blocked by Sevier County Jail Annex. Learn more about how to control your inmate's phone calls in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
How do I make a deposit into a Sevier County Jail Annex inmate's phone account?
GTL Connect network has five different options for making deposits for your inmate's phone account: (1) Online, at the GTL Connect network website. (2) By phone - Call - 877-650-4249. (3) At the Sevier County Jail Annex lobby kiosk. (4) By mailing a check or money order to: AdvancePay Service Department - P.O. Box 911722 - Denver, CO 80291-1722. (5) Walk-in retail locations such as Western Union Quick Collect [Blue Form], Walmart, ACE, Kmart, Kroger, and more. Learn more about how to deposit money for an inmate's phone account in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
Who is ViaPath Technologies?
GTL Connect Network and their sister company GTL gettingout are currently undergoing a merger and rebranding into a single entity called ViaPath Technologies. During this transition, all of the current services, links and prices will remain the same. Sevier County Jail Annex, and family members and friends of inmates will not see any changes during the transition, as it will be a slow, measured, seamless process. The end result will be a more responsive company with even better services for you and your inmates.
Do inmates in the Sevier County Jail Annex have access to tablets?
Yes. Sevier County Jail Annex is transitioning to having free tablets available to all inmates for basic services. In addition, you will be able to purchase tablet subscriptions which will include, music, movie streaming, educational programming, legal research and more. Learn more about how to rent a tablet for an inmate in the Sevier County Jail Annex.
