here in chile we dont longer use voicemail, cant remember when was the last time i heard one… That said, a lot of people send whatsapp audios, i understand its easier for some folks, but, common!
In Colombia I get a shocking number of voice messages via WhatsApp. I got a 4-minute message from my landlord last week that had 20 seconds of actual information.
The transcribe option in the app is reasonably good, but it’s not 100% accurate.
When I had a work mobile phone in Australia I had my voicemail saying I was on leave and to call the office.
The boss wasn’t happy, but the customers actually called the service desk because of it.
Your boss would be breaking the law in Australia, now explicitly under the new right to disconnect legislation, if they said anything about it.
(Though, could have probably been argued in the past also as unpaid overtime in the past)
This was a decade ago. He was actually annoyed that I didn’t change it after I got back from holidays.
So I was working, the customer would call and get the voicemail on my mobile, then call the main support line and got me.
Is that not normal? Most people business wise I’ve contacted or even for medical stuff in Canada they do. Auto email response, change voicemail to contact X or the receptionist.
No, almost everyone I know would have “leave a message and I will call you back.”
They’re saying they left the voicemail as “on leave” when they were not in reality
i have mine turned off from the cell provider. best thing i did.
Yeah, until she applies for a job and the recruiter tried to call her to offer an interview.
For me the most annoying part of voicemail is navigating through the menu. But I’m also not scared of taking to people on the phone so perhaps my opinion doesn’t count here.
Good luck to her when she wants to start being taken seriously.
Depends on the industry. In my industry, Email is king and text is Queen. Unless its a zoom call, it ain’t happening.
lol, only production matters child, once you are ready to become a Worker™, then you you will be required to use voicemail
I work with engineers in an industry where not having a written exchange of info to refer to and/or CYA is unthinkable. I got my latest company phone 17 months ago and have not set up the voicemail yet.
Only production matters, so why use something slow, inefficient, that also does not provide an automatic written record to cover your ass.
If you call me with a request to do work or give me important information, I will tell you to text or email that to me.
I agree many meetings should be emails. But when meetings happen, generally someone takes minutes and notes down actions so, that covers that base I suppose. Secondly, if I’m your employer, or your client, and I call you with a request, or a job, then it’s probably in your best interest to get it done. Sure, a follow up email is sometimes warranted, but not always. People who refuse to use the phone to communicate verbally are only disadvantaging themselves.
If you call me with a request to do work or give me important information, I will tell you to text or email that to me.
Same I end every meeting where someone asks me to do something with a request for them to email me spelling it out. I don’t care if we covered all the ins and outs verbally and I already made notes, I want a paper trail of their expectations. The intention really being to train them that meeting first is a waste of time and they should just email me in the first place. If I don’t understand what you want I’ll set up a call.
Por que no los dos? I’m just saying. In a professional setting, when they don’t respond to text or email, you can follow up with a text that says, “I left your dumbass a voice mail if you don’t feel like reading.”
I disabled my voicemail. Problem solved.
I’ve never had it enabled
I had a phone set up as a tablet. It couldn’t send or receive SMS or calls. It was a beautiful decade.
Then microsoft killed skype-in and skype-out, because they worked really well and the glitter-junkies who’ve shat something new and broken and slow onto the public needed less competition with working apps. Had to get a new plan with a number that worked. Received a shit call and it went to voicemail on the way from the store to the train.
I had voicemail enabled for 10 minutes and it was hell.
Over here whenever you get a new provider, the voicemail is automatically enabled. You need to actively disable it or you are being spammed with messages from your mom saying “hi, yeah, so I tried to call, but you didn’t pick up… So, I’ll try again in 2 minutes. Bye!” “hi, yeah, so I tried to call you again, but still you didn’t pick up. Why aren’t you picking up? Anyway, I’ll try again in a bit. Bye!” etc.
Damn I’m so curious about the venn diagram overlap between pet who hate calls and people who love video “news” like tiktok. I bet it’s near a circle.
I, for one, hate both equally. I want to READ my news, and I don’t even care if it comes with static images.
I’m an old guy, but I hate voice mail. Mine says “You can try to leave a message, but it’s probably full, and I’ll never listen to it anyway, so either send a text to this number, or send an email to XXX, and I’ll get back to you ASAP.”
This is the way.
Though, I have found that the default message of “pinball_wizard has not configured their voicemail” conveys the same message pretty effectively, too.
I used to troll with mine and spell out my name, phone number, email address, website, all twice.
Most voice-mails I got were like “JESUS FUCKING CHRIST WHY IS YOUR MESSAGE SO LONG”
top kek
Mine is “You have reached my phone but not me, I don’t really check voicemail, if you need to reach me, text.” I still get voicemail.
Some voicemail the phone will transcribe, those I read but really don’t listen to them.
Some people just can’t fathom communicating other than a voice call lol
Why I still end up listening to a voicemail after reading the transcription:
Edit: Image had a visible phone number in it. Wasn’t mine (just grabbed from Google) but still probably not cool to spread that around. 😔
I’d still have to because the new voice mail notification won’t go away until you at least pop in and delete it or listen.
mine is a simple “leave me a voicemail and I will hate you forever”
My kid can make 100 push ups, when Nobody’s watching.I love that meme! I can see this one being real though
ya if the child is old enough to know what a phone call is, they are old enough to understand how pointless voicemails are
See, for me, if you call me and don’t leave a voicemail, I’m going to assume it was unimportant (or spam) and I won’t call back. Businesses, which are most likely going to an unknown number, should leave a voicemail if they want any action on my part. I mostly don’t want businesses texting me because they tend to spam the fuck out of you. And I’m sure as fuck never going to pick up the phone for an unknown number.
Recently, I’ve been getting calls I’m pretty sure are spam. They are all from different numbers, but all of the area codes are from where I got my phone number, which is quite far from where I live now. Additionally, they all do leave voicemails, but each and every one is exactly thirty seconds of silence.
Spam or not, I can’t figure out the point.
Probably a bot waiting for a voice in order to start. It waits until it hangs up.
That makes sense, and I appreciate the information.
You’d think they would have marked me as inactive by now - they’ve been calling every day or two, including weekends, for more than a month. I haven’t answered once! The persistence is the only thing that made me question whether it was spam.
I got that kind of call for four years after I got a new phone number. 2-3 times a day. Plus texts offering to buy Tuyet’s home, appointment reminders for her & her kid’s(?) doctor, occasional temp-staffing offers. You can’t beat them by not answering.
It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop… ever, until
you are deadit’s no longer profitable to operate the automated service!
They spoof a number close to your number to increase the chance you pickup, they don’t know you moved.
I’d bet the silence calls are to determine if a phone number is active.
I definitely know about the spoofing - that’s what made me figure it was spam initially.
The waiting for a voice response makes sense, but I’ve never encountered a system that didn’t at least say some form of “hello.” Not this persistent of one, anyway.
Thanks!
Interesting, one of the recent voicemails I received was a very high-quality voice courtesy one of everyone’s favorite text-to-speech companies (perhaps ElevenLabs)
Wonder if it’s possible they were trying to route on the fly, if they had such a low latency system that they’re able to wait for potential victims to say hello before instantly transferring to a human scammer.
It’s AI, I’d be willing to bet. Waiting to detect a human before responding with whatever scam they’re selling.
that doesn’t really require AI lol
Playing back a message when you hear someone pick up? No, they’ve been doing that forever. But trying to determine whether you have a human on the line or just their voicemail recording? That’s something that could start to require more sophisticated language models, and the fact that the message didn’t just start rattling something off as soon as something picked up suggests maybe they’re using it. Actual phone scams using AI? Well, if they’re not doing it yet, they will be soon.
Had this problem too (phone number is from NM but I’m in MA now) so I just started messing with them. I’d answer “Federal Bureau of Investigation, Albuquerque district office, how may I direct your call?” Click. After about a week of doing this I haven’t gotten a single spam call, this was like 2 years ago. Who cares it it’s “impersonating a federal agency” or whatever, they’re scammers overseas, fuck em.
And I’m sure as fuck never going to pick up the phone for an unknown number.
You’ve gotta be diligent: if you do business with something, like a project or an appointment, you need to drop their number into your contact list. Every time. Yeah, it’s neat if you need to reach out to them, which will be never because it’s on the phone, but it’s primarily so they can call you and not be unknown.
I’d love a QR code with the org’s phone/mail/blah number on it at the front desk, because I do in-person a lot because fuck the phone.
Sometimes it’s fun, when you know it’s spam, to answer it while it’s ringing (which may let the operator know ‘hey, they answered, start talking’) and quickly hit Speaker and Mute and enjoy 5-10 sec of them being confused when they hear silence back.
Mine emails me an attachment with the recording. It’s a lot easier than the old call up voicemail to listen to your messages etc. Lot of people prefer it to writing with their phones.
Brilliant. I’m stealing this.
I worked for nearly a decade as product support for various voice mail applications, so I feel very strongly about this.
Fuck voice mail.
