When you first enter a Lot that has a THE Front Desk that is manned by a receptionist on it, the animation states of the phone handset are out of sync with the animations of the Sim using it.
You need to remain on the Lot for several in-game hours before the states and animations match up again.
When a call comes in, the handset vanishes before the Sim picks it up and there is a noticable delay before the handset returns to the phone base afterwards.
When the Sim makes a call over the PA system, the handset vanishes for several in-game hours while the receptionist Sim continues to work on the computer before they make the call. Sometimes the handset returns correctly at the end of use and other times it continues to be missing for a noticable amount of time.
During my latest test, at one point, the handset didn't vanish at all while the receptionist Sim used it.
I do use mods but removed them for the purposes of testing in a clean save. I own EP01, EP02, EP03, EP04, EP05, EP06, EP07, EP09, EP10, EP11, EP12, EP13, EP17, EP18, GP01, GP02, GP03, GP04, GP05, GP06, GP07, GP08, GP10, GP12, SP01, SP02, SP03, SP04, SP05, SP06, SP07, SP08, SP09, SP10, SP11, SP12, SP13, SP14, SP15, SP16, SP17, SP18 and a handful of Kits.
