// $client is PHP's SoapClient class
try {
  $response = $client->SomeSoapRequest();
}
catch(SoapFault $e){
  // handle issues returned by the web service
}
catch(Exception $e){
  // handle PHP issues with the request
}

$client = new SoapClient($wsdl, array("connection_timeout"=>10));

// SET SOCKET TIMEOUT
if(defined('RESPONSE_TIMEOUT') &&  RESPONSE_TIMEOUT != '') {
 ini_set('default_socket_timeout', RESPONSE_TIMEOUT);
}