Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, iPhone
David Pogue and his 'Take Back the Beep' campaign
David Pogue, who writes on tech for the New York Times had an interesting and thoughtful column yesterday. He's been complaining about the ridiculously long messages the cellular carriers stick on to the end of your voicemail message. He's right, too. But what I hadn't realized was that these incessant and long messages add to your air time and are bringing in millions of dollars of extra, and unearned revenue to the cellphone providers.Here's a sample from the column of how, instead of a simple beep, the phone companies game the system to add to your minutes:
* Sprint: "[Phone number] is not available right now. Please leave a detailed message after the tone. When you have finished recording, you may hang up, or press pound for more options."
* Verizon: "At the tone, please record your message. When you have finished recording, you may hang up, or press 1 for more options. To leave a callback number, press 5. (Beep)"
* AT&T: "To page this person, press five now. At the tone, please record your message. When you are finished, you may hang up, or press one for more options."
* T-Mobile: "Record your message after the tone. To send a numeric page, press five. When you are finished recording, hang up, or for delivery options, press pound."
It would be nice to be able to turn this stuff off, but it really isn't possible. There is one nice surprise in all this bad news. When Apple made the deal with AT&T, Apple insisted these messages not be on iPhone voice mail. When you call me you get MY message, and a beep. Just like that. No "dial 2 for the temperature in Des Moines" or "touch the pound key three times quickly, pause and one more click to get customer service if you are north of latitude 40 degrees." This is an example of something Apple and AT&T did that actually benefited iPhone owners, especially given all the latest circus with Skype, SlingPlayer, and Google.
Pogue has this exactly right. Cellphone users should complain to high heaven about these rather egregious violations of common sense and just plain smart customer relations. iPhone owners got off easy with voice mail. But we're bearing a heavy load as Apple and AT&T try to outdo each other in alienating their customers.
There oughta be a law.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Kevin Harter said 8:50AM on 7-31-2009
What do you have against Des Moines? =)
BTW, it's 59 degrees there this morning. Brrr!
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Noah said 11:26AM on 7-31-2009
Ugh! I've ALWAYS hated that.
At least with some carriers, you can press "1" to skip right to leaving a voicemail.
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pg5220 said 12:25PM on 7-31-2009
Agreed.
Dave said 12:53PM on 7-31-2009
Yup, pressing 1 allows callers to skip all that crap and go straight to the beep on Sprint. Also, when checking your voicemail, 1 skips all the prompts. Got a new message? Mash 1 a couple of times and you'll get right to it.
Kevin said 1:03PM on 7-31-2009
The point of this complaint is that we already know how to use voice mail. If you can bypass the message by pressing 1, then do it.
If you know you can do it, but you wait, then you're wasting your own minutes.
If you don't know you can do it then you don't really know how to use voice mail.
Alex Paris said 6:48PM on 7-31-2009
WIth others you use #
James said 11:30AM on 7-31-2009
on sprint you can change your settings to not play the directions, just go directly to the beep!
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Ben said 11:34AM on 7-31-2009
I agree. It's like I've never left a voicemail before. Is that how it works!? Thanks AT&T, I was really confused before.
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Matthew Brady said 11:46AM on 7-31-2009
One thing I noticed about AT&T DSL Customer Service is that they are curiously closed at the time when free nights and weekends start.
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go2jo said 11:46AM on 7-31-2009
@hipsterwallet wrote in a tweet today:
For Sprint, go to voicemail, then * for main menu, then 3, 2, 1, 3 to remove voicemail "instructions" for your callers.
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Andrew said 11:59AM on 7-31-2009
Even when I call my OWN voicemail I can't get directly to my messages.
First I'm stuck with "Please enter your password..." You can't turn asking for a password. If someone has my phone the last thing care about is if they can hear my voicemail.
Then you get the 3 second pause followed by the "You have one unheard message, two skipped messages, one saved message. Main menu to hear our messages press one, one. To change your personal message press three, to change your personal options press four, to disconnect press star.
One you press one, one you get another 3 second pause. If you want to delete the message you have to press, seven, but you can't do it mid message you have to wait until the whole message is heard. Then of course you get the whole slew of other options before hearing the next message.
To hear a 5 second message I have to have a minimum of a 45 second phone call. It's ridiculous!
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peterhenric said 12:12PM on 7-31-2009
"As Apple & AT&T try to outdo each other in alienating their customers" What are you talking about? I agree about AT&T trying to alienate their customers but where does Apple fit into that?
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nickux said 12:13PM on 7-31-2009
To paraphrase a great comment on Engadget: Next stop, world hunger.
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Jeffery Egbert said 12:18PM on 7-31-2009
On ATT you just need to go and and turn off the "Cut Through Paging" option.
Call voicemail and select:
4-Personal Options
2-Administrative Options
7-Cut Through Paging > Set to OFF
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todd said 12:20PM on 7-31-2009
Finally! I've posted my comments on all 4 carrier's forums. Hope they listen.
In addition, they should stop "double charging" for text messages (they charge the sender to send it and the receiver to receive it).
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Edsel said 12:21PM on 7-31-2009
We don't really *need* cell phones. The world existed for millions of years without them, why have they become so indispensable now? Relax, send a postcard ;)
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puhsitch said 4:26PM on 7-31-2009
I say the same thing all the time about automobiles and indoor plumbing!
jop said 12:26PM on 7-31-2009
in the UK there is still a message after my personal greeting on the iphone. althouh very short "please leave your message after the tone"
She kinda just reiterates what I have already told my would be call just to avoid any confusion
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KTaylor said 12:27PM on 7-31-2009
Slow news day?
As was previously eluded to, this "feature" is ridiculously easy to turn off--if you take the time to delve through your phone's voicemail settings. I've been a sprint customer since 2000, and my voicemail is (and will always be) free of the "carrier directions."
Can't really give Apple credit for that one--blaming a carrier for a co
plicated voicemail server is akin to blaming Mediacom for making a VCR too difficult to program.
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SpinThis! said 1:13PM on 7-31-2009
Having the ability is great but that's not the point of the article. Pogue is arguing it should be this way out of the box. A lot of people don't even take the time to setup their own voicemail greeting let alone mess around with the settings. Carriers are banking on customer ignorance which is true capitalism at its worst.