Voicemail should be banned

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.
- 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.
- Probably a bot waiting for a voice in order to start. It waits until it hangs up.
- 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.
- It's AI, I'd be willing to bet. Waiting to detect a human before responding with whatever scam they're selling.
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.

Then the person sends you a 2 minute long audio over whatsapp

Not if I don't have whatsapp.
At least I can get a transcript and speed it up a bit

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

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.

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.
- They're saying they left the voicemail as "on leave" when they were not in reality
- No, almost everyone I know would have "leave a message and I will call you back."
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.

The True Crime here is an 11 year old child with a (I suppose) Smartphone.

I would totally understand if it was in a place where your kids can take a walk or public transport to school or other places on their own. I would also want them to have means to call you.
EDIT: my bad, I ignored the 'smart' bit there. I just meant any phone.
Can be a normal phone which is what I would do if I where a parent and my kid would have to bike 12 km to school every day.
- Sounds perfectly reasonable to me. I'd just like to mention that it was perfectly normal for kids to go on 12km without a phone not so long ago, and I don't think there's anything wrong with it now. Parents worry too much. I mean, it's a biological impulse that makes a lot of sense, but it's often over done.
- Normal Phone would be fine :)
Whatever you say Grandpa
- Ok, brainrot

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.

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.
Some people just can't fathom communicating other than a voice call lol

Since about 2006 my voicemail message has been "for a faster response send me a text message." When I started my business I added my business name and rerecorded the rest. If a client can't send a text instead of call then I'm going to charge them more.

That's a greater idea I'm doing that

The absolute worst thing about voicemail is that you can't just listen to the one you just got. I have about 50 unheard voicemails at this point. You leave one? I have to work my way through 50 just to hear yours. And it doesn't even let me work from most recent. Nope. Just never going to happen.

huh? Android lets you pick from a menu.
- What? How do you set that up?
Most smartphones offer voicemail transcription now, I believe. Or at least Apple does. I don't have voicemail set up on my Android phone to check.
I used to use an app called Hullomail which brought them into an app as voice clips you can see the caller and play or export.
It also showed you missed calls while your phone was off since they can just flag when a call was redirected to them. Super useful.
IIRC they got acquired and removed the free tier but you might still find them useful.
It is ridiculous that in 2025 you still don’t have random access voicemail.
Life must really suck when you're too dumb to know how things work.
- As your dad proved when he couldn't figure out the condom

This is perfect. At least boomers have an excuse. Millennials using voice notes is unforgivable.

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.

That's actually really smart lol

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."

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
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.

Voicemail is actually really nice, if people call you and don't leave a message, the call was not important or a spam call. Its like the perfect filter.

Yeah but I get like 5 spam calls a week from "Nicole with loan processing" or "Joshua Martinez from the loan issuance department" and they always leave a voicemail that I have to delete because I tried to get a personal loan 4 months ago.

Visual voicemail (voicemail transcribed to text) has been a godsend for me. The number of doctors offices that call with an unlisted number is staggering.

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.

i think I have my voicemail as the disconnected phone sound to stave off robocallers. anybody who wanted to call me texted me immediately after to confirm.

at least in germany you can just disable voicemail

Brb moving to Germany

Back in the day, I realized there wasn't really a voice-mail message length limit, so I had a 20 minute rant about why I don't want voicemails

I don’t like voicemail typically, but I have some voicemails from family members who have passed away and I cherish listening to them.

If I were you, I would save a copy of them somewhere safe. I wouldn't trust a phone company or my phone to hold on to voicemails forever.

But one could set up an Archer style voicemail prank!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5kIVXNCzDA

I disabled my voicemail. Problem solved.

I've never had it enabled
- 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.
- 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.

Need to teach her how to turn off voicemail redirection.

i have mine turned off from the cell provider. best thing i did.

I get voicemail from blocked numbers

You need to setup your phone to answer and then hang up automatically on the callers. On my Pixel I only get VMs from spam callers if I didn't have any signal at the time.
- That would tell them the line and number is valid. Not interested in perpetuating their tripe.

Until someone sends you a voice to text message. Like fuck that.

My little sister's voicemail says something along the lines of , "Hi, I'm either sleeping or playing video games. Leave a message and maybe I'll call back"

I worked for nearly a decade as product support for various voice mail applications, so I feel very strongly about this.

Fuck voice mail.

Voice notes on WhatsApp/iMessage is essentially the exact same thing as voicemail but for some reason zoomers are happier with those.

Navigating the voicemail menu is really annoying
- Agree, haven't had to use it for a while. Not sure why I was defending it... maybe couldn't resist an opportunity to dunk on zoomers.

It's a double edged sword:

1.) Not all phone lines have text enabled (especially service lines).

2.) One reason you might not answer a call is because you don't recognize it. So if the line in question doesn't have text options then you might miss important calls if you don't check your voicemail.

3.) If you don't take unknown calls and you don't check voicemails then you probably won't answer random text messages either.

At the end of the day more people need to be grown ups and at least have a decent voicemail message and check their voicemails as they come in. It's not an all or nothing discussion, it's a do the minimum discussion. Screen your calls, check your voicemails, call people back who seem legit. It's not rocket science, it's adulthood.

Yup. Sucks to have to remember to take phone off "Do Not Disturb" to get business call backs.
Where I'm from, voicemail is just not used. If a person doesn't pick up, you try again later. Answering machines were not a thing either. Always thought it was weird people used them in movies. I remember maybe leaving one message in my life, never had it myself.
- Yeah, where I am from it's primarily used by businesses these days. Most people don't answer phone calls from numbers they don't know so if it's important business then they leave you a voicemail. The thing is that if you don't then check your voicemails you miss important business. It has a lot of other odd impacts as well, I was in a car accident not to long ago and the guy that hit me broke his phone and tried to use mine to call his emergency contacts. As you might have guessed no one answered because they didn't recognize the number and he wasn't able to call anyone for help.
How about no?
I hope this is your one and only pet peeve

Voice mail still has uses. There are times you need to be able to receive calls from businesses or government entities. Often those entities don't have call centers set up to let their workes send texts. Sometimes the only way you can hear news you need to hear is via a phone call.

Which is kinda funny because they could save money by automating texting for some of the shit they have people call for.
Though on the other hand, if it's a legitimate business, you can stop the call spam easier, at least in places with enforced do not call lists.
That sounds like their problem, and they should fix that. Probably cheaper in the long run too.

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.

Voicemail would be fine if you could click on the voice message in a table and so it could skip the time and number

Fizz had a visual voicemail app that lets you do that.

And then people wonder why nobody has friends and prefer talking to an AI

Brilliant. I'm stealing this.

I am hard of hearing. I hate voicemail. And, I hate that I can no longer record voicemail. There has been too many incidences where I can't understand the crucial details in a voicemail.

I prefer voice mail, If it's important enough send it, if you're not a contact and there's no caller ID I'm not picking up, I'm not screening your call I don't want you to know I saw the call.

If you're a contact and I miss you send a text

mine is a simple "leave me a voicemail and I will hate you forever"

Hag up before the beep! Or else it just record you hanging up, and leave me a voice message to delete.

Usually you want to just record dead air for the maximum time your provider gives you for the message

Hey, I'm as smart as a 11 year old!

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.

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."