Fido, Why Do I Have To Pay You For Voicemail?
December 27, 2015 11:23 AM Subscribe
Why does my iPhone require carrier-based voicemail service? Why can't it handle voicemail entirely on the phone itself?
When I first got an iPhone, I got roped into a contract with a high monthly rate, but it worked nicely, including having voicemails on my iPhone as "local" voicemail. I always assumed this was my iPhone handling voicemail internally--without my carrier being involved, my phone would answer after x rings, play my greeting, and record a voicemail.
After getting out of the contract and switching to a much cheaper plan, suddenly I had to phone my carrier to get my voicemail, working through voice prompts, etc. It seemed like an idiotic step backwards, but I don't handle enough calls for it to be really annoying. Until it was. So I called and cancelled the voicemail portion of my service, assuming it would go back to how it was before.
Nope. Now calls to my phone would hit eight rings and disconnect. After googling, I found this feature is called "visual voicemail", and seems to work by my carrier pushing voicemails to my phone after recording them, so that they work locally. I called my carrier and agreed to another incremental charge to get this back.
So, two questions: 1) why does it have to be this way? Why does the carrier need to be involved at all when the iPhone is surely capable of handling this as I assumed it was? 2) Am I really stuck with 'visual voicemail' and an incremental charge, or is this something that the iPhone phone app or another app can handle for me on the phone?
When I first got an iPhone, I got roped into a contract with a high monthly rate, but it worked nicely, including having voicemails on my iPhone as "local" voicemail. I always assumed this was my iPhone handling voicemail internally--without my carrier being involved, my phone would answer after x rings, play my greeting, and record a voicemail.
After getting out of the contract and switching to a much cheaper plan, suddenly I had to phone my carrier to get my voicemail, working through voice prompts, etc. It seemed like an idiotic step backwards, but I don't handle enough calls for it to be really annoying. Until it was. So I called and cancelled the voicemail portion of my service, assuming it would go back to how it was before.
Nope. Now calls to my phone would hit eight rings and disconnect. After googling, I found this feature is called "visual voicemail", and seems to work by my carrier pushing voicemails to my phone after recording them, so that they work locally. I called my carrier and agreed to another incremental charge to get this back.
So, two questions: 1) why does it have to be this way? Why does the carrier need to be involved at all when the iPhone is surely capable of handling this as I assumed it was? 2) Am I really stuck with 'visual voicemail' and an incremental charge, or is this something that the iPhone phone app or another app can handle for me on the phone?
Also, FWIW I don't pay for visual VM with T-Mobile. They are constantly trying to sell me an upgrade, but the basic VM message stored on the phone is part of the basic service.
You could use Google Voice if you want free voice mail. It'll transcribe the message and send it via email so you don't ever have to log and go through the prompts. It may also send the actual message as an attachment.
posted by COD at 12:17 PM on December 27, 2015 [1 favorite]
You could use Google Voice if you want free voice mail. It'll transcribe the message and send it via email so you don't ever have to log and go through the prompts. It may also send the actual message as an attachment.
posted by COD at 12:17 PM on December 27, 2015 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: I understand the carrier's role in voicemail if you're not on the network. I'm surprised that the carrier is still required to be involved when you are on the network. I'd assumed that smartphones would naturally swallow this functionality since they could, and could conceivably offer much better functionality. I'd happily go without voicemail when I'm totally unavailable and rely on my phone's handling of it when it can.
posted by fatbird at 12:19 PM on December 27, 2015
posted by fatbird at 12:19 PM on December 27, 2015
No answer as to the why, but seconding Google voice as an alternative. There is an iPhone app through which you can read the transcript and listen to the recording, or you can access it online. They don't seem to be putting a whole lot of effort into marketing or improving GV, but despite rumors that it was on the chopping block I've used it for a year or two without problem.
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 12:26 PM on December 27, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 12:26 PM on December 27, 2015 [1 favorite]
And yes, GV includes the recording in the email as well. The transcripts are not always the best, depending on the quality of the recording and the clearness of the speaker, but since I can always listen to the recording this isn't a problem.
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 12:28 PM on December 27, 2015
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 12:28 PM on December 27, 2015
Consider it to be the same reason that the Postal Service delivers mail to your mailbox, whether or not you're at home.
posted by suedehead at 12:49 PM on December 27, 2015
posted by suedehead at 12:49 PM on December 27, 2015
I'd expect that a special app could handle this. Have you looked for one?
posted by amtho at 1:01 PM on December 27, 2015
posted by amtho at 1:01 PM on December 27, 2015
Response by poster: There are some apps, but not many, and most of them appear to be specifically for certain telephony services. The most prominent one has only 72 reviews in total, and looks like it takes over a lot of things, similar to Google Voice. Overall, it doesn't appear to be a very active segment, so I guess that a lack of demand just hasn't driven independent development in this area.
posted by fatbird at 1:19 PM on December 27, 2015
posted by fatbird at 1:19 PM on December 27, 2015
Best answer: It's not just that the carriers can offer you voicemail when you're offline, there are a whole lot of not-totally-surmountable technical concerns that make on-device voicemail iffy.
* When you're on the phone, other callers can be directed by the carrier to carrier-provided voicemail. That wouldn't work with on-device voicemail, which would only be able to manage one caller at a time, with the other callers getting busy signals.
* You wouldn't be able to place a call while someone was leaving voicemail with on-device recording - and with some providers and in some areas, you also also wouldn't be able to use *data* services while someone was leaving voicemail.
* Carrier-provided voicemail has virtually no impact on battery life. On-device voicemail would utilize the battery to maintain an active cell connection to record the message.
* You can still call into your carrier voicemail when your phone is dead, or in an area without service. Not so with on-device voicemail.
* You may be a big spender and have a 128GB iPhone with lots of memory, but others with less may have to worry about a large number of voicemail messages filling their RAM.
* With on-device voicemail, you could lose signal (or run out of memory, or RAM) while someone's recording a message. That's a much less likely scenario with carrier voicemail.
In short, it makes a whole lot of sense to use carrier-provided voicemail in terms of reliability. But it really is too bad that the carrier voicemail systems are all, as you've noticed, pretty bad.
But, wait, the real issue is that your carrier is trying to charge you for visual voicemail? I get visual voicemail for free on my el-cheapo $35 Cricket plan. I didn't think that was something that was still happening. You may just need a different cheap provider.
posted by eschatfische at 2:03 PM on December 27, 2015 [3 favorites]
* When you're on the phone, other callers can be directed by the carrier to carrier-provided voicemail. That wouldn't work with on-device voicemail, which would only be able to manage one caller at a time, with the other callers getting busy signals.
* You wouldn't be able to place a call while someone was leaving voicemail with on-device recording - and with some providers and in some areas, you also also wouldn't be able to use *data* services while someone was leaving voicemail.
* Carrier-provided voicemail has virtually no impact on battery life. On-device voicemail would utilize the battery to maintain an active cell connection to record the message.
* You can still call into your carrier voicemail when your phone is dead, or in an area without service. Not so with on-device voicemail.
* You may be a big spender and have a 128GB iPhone with lots of memory, but others with less may have to worry about a large number of voicemail messages filling their RAM.
* With on-device voicemail, you could lose signal (or run out of memory, or RAM) while someone's recording a message. That's a much less likely scenario with carrier voicemail.
In short, it makes a whole lot of sense to use carrier-provided voicemail in terms of reliability. But it really is too bad that the carrier voicemail systems are all, as you've noticed, pretty bad.
But, wait, the real issue is that your carrier is trying to charge you for visual voicemail? I get visual voicemail for free on my el-cheapo $35 Cricket plan. I didn't think that was something that was still happening. You may just need a different cheap provider.
posted by eschatfische at 2:03 PM on December 27, 2015 [3 favorites]
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posted by nicwolff at 11:37 AM on December 27, 2015 [5 favorites]