iPhone 5: no sound from speaker while making calls.

My iPhone 5 is just about two months old and the ear speaker has begun failing.

Initially, I thought it was a problem with the other party - the other party could hear me but I could not hear anything (not low volume - NO sound whatsoever). Then I found that by placing the call on speakerphone, I could hear and have conversations.

By hitting the phone and/or adjusting the ear volume control, the sound suddenly turns on again but it is inconsistant and doesn't always fail or work again after failure.

Bottom line is that there is a problem. Can someone tell me what Apple's policy is on this? My phone was purchased through my provider.

Thanks

I cannot speak for everyone in this thread but my iPhone 5 64GB blk phone (on TELUS network) began exhibiting this same problem about 1 1/2 months after purchase. At first, it was an intermittent problem, which I erroneously thought was the fault of the other party. The only way to continue a conversation was by connecting the ear phones or placing the phone in speaker mode.

This is absolutely a hardware problem because I soon discovered that tapping the back of the phone (behind the ear speaker) would temporarily cause the speaker to work (with a little static on occasion - clearly a loose connection).

Two days ago, Apple 'Genius Bar' were convinced that the repair was simply a Receiver module (part # 923 - 00210), even though I explained that it was more likely a loose connection. Yes, the ear speaker was working again immediately after the repair but sure enough, the next day, it began failing again!

I can't speak for others but I think there is a common thread with poor electrical connection on the ear speaker.

Confirmed: Turing off Bluetooth fixes this problem.

I recently received a replacement iPhone 5 from App (the flash died on the original one).

A few days after upgrading to iOS 7 the speaker in the earpiece started playing up where it wouldnt work for a couple days then would randomly start working again. Loudspeaker works fine.

Tried turning Bluetooth off as suggested here and it works fine now.

This is a software bug which hopefully Apple will realease a fix for soon.

Thank you. Worked great. I turned Bluetooth back on when playing a song. All is well in my iPhone land again. Whew.

Turning off Bluetooth, then turning it back on has corrected the "low sound" issue associated w/playing voicemail messages. Thank you to whomever discovered that fix. Merry Christmas.

iPhone 5 was replaced 2 months ago due to powerbutton issue. In the last 3 days, speaker is now off. No help rebooting, no help turning off blue tooths. Headset works fine. The silence swith is not engaged.

New speaker at Apple Store, now works fine.

Had the same issue, tried all kinds of resets, the last option was turn off bluetooth, it works now. I use bluetooth in the car a lot for podcastson the way to work. The phone I guess thought it was still in the car working off bluetooth.