We should probably just add a checkbox for it in the management UI though now that I think about it.
Now, each individual case where an employee unexpectedly helps out is great, but this is NOT 'how you run a company'. You should focus on getting your general customer service and support lines to be good.
I've never dealt with this company before, or even heard of them until today, so their normal lines of support might be great. This isn't meant to be a specific criticism of Charge.
However, it does seem odd to me that a phone company appears to give no contact phone numbers on their web site. That's not a good sign!
For now, whenever a customer has a problem that can't be solved via email, one of the founders will call.
Obviously that doesn't scale, so we need to figure out phone support, but we're aiming for what I call "Zappos-level" quality and that's easier said than done.
I just expect this from any tech company today. It's not like you're going to get assistance from anyone at Google, for instance. I tried forever when someone was abusing our open source trademark and then doxxed me on blogspot. But all the "official" channels were completely ignored. I think my unlisted home phone number and old office address is still posted there with a call for people to harass me for DMCAing pirated commercial software they had hosted on random locker sites that used my GPLed code in violation of the license to package it.
This is your expected outcome when you are wealthy.
Yes, but what happens when you disable voicemail ?
ATT wireless can disable vm for me, it just results in weird behavior that confuses people...
If I disable voicemail on Charge, and am out of coverage area (or have phone turned off) what does the caller experience ?
We could actually set up some fancy forwarding to make this message configurable, similar to how Google Voice's voicemail works.
> We’re working hard to add support for GSM devices. Enter your email and you’ll be the first to know when we're ready!
So it looks like they're trying to support GSM, which probably involves deals with large GSM carriers, I would guess, since Sprint only uses CDMA.
Some reasons for 10 rings:
* must wipe butt
* must get kids out of swimming pool
* must shut down the tractor (there exist loud outside ringers)
* must finish... because not Paris Hilton
* must put baby into a safe spot (crib, strapped into chair, playpen, etc.)
* must remove engine oil from hands
That was a world I liked better. Answering machines ruined it. At first they were set to at least 4 rings. This caused people to start hanging up earlier, and assuming that others would do likewise. If you assume this, you won't run for the phone, thereby discouraging people from waiting. It's a feedback loop. Later, answering machines were set to just 2 rings. I guess cell phones were the final nail in the coffin for the old 10-ring standard. Since many people would carry their phone, callers got used to immediate pick-up. Not every phone is a cell phone! Even if that were so, many of the old reasons still apply!
Lesson learned for modern world might be to send messages asynchronously by default with a note to call them soon or at some time range if it's extra important. I mean, it's what we do with email and messaging for sure. Let's just not forget that maybe the person on the other end doesn't want to answer or even look at the phone.
I would also like the ability to play a message, but then have no ability to leave a message.
The lame way to do this is to let your vm inbox fill up, and then everyone gets the "the person you called is too stupid to figure out voicemail" message.
What I would like is an option to play a message ("hi you've reached so and so and here is my email address and have a nice day!") and then ... no beep ... no message ... nothing. Maybe just pause a bit and then a fast-busy.[1]
How can I do things like this ? I've been meaning for years to self-provide my own dial tone in the same way I self-provide my own email, but I just don't have the time to get it all set up.
Related anecdote, I have a friend who lives in NYC who told me he recorded his voicemail to start with the beep (or beeps?) that sound like a network confirmation of a call hang up, and then his "Please leave me a message" message a couple of seconds later, so that automated dialers would be fooled into thinking the call was dead, and hang up rather than leave a message. I'm not familiar with American phone systems and am not sure if this is a story from the past (he's certainly been hacking systems for longer than I've been alive) or if it's still useful to this day (I'll pay attention if I ever call and get his voicemail, but we don't speak often).
---
Hi, this is Evan.
I will never ever ever ever listen to the voice mail you’re about to leave, because voice mail is a pain in the butt.
So if you actually want to reach me, you can either send me an SMS, send me e-mail, or try my home number.
Feel free to leave a voice message if you want, but remember, I will never ever listen to it. Have a nice day!
---
I don't actually give them the email or home number details on the assumption that if they don't have those already, they are probably someone who's call I'm that stressed about receiving.
Generally I got positive feedback once people did get in contact with me.
I did have a similar one on message bank on the home number, which also mentioned that I keep turning message bank off, and the phone company kept turning it back on again.
@post_break: Don't know that I would characterise it as passive aggressive. It isn't meant to be, certainly not to the caller. As I said, most people who heard it found it amusing more than annoying. One even asked if they could steal the idea.
I previously had a phone on Vodafone in the UK, and infuriatingly their voicemail system would not allow you to delete a message until you had listened to it for either 3 or 5 seconds, I can't remember.
Most of my messages were either spam calls I knew would have left a voicemail from when I rejected them, or my dad who has finally learned that I'm just as likely to call him back from seeing him in my missed calls list and therefore he no longer needs to leave a "Hey, it's me calling, feel free to call back or not" every single time. (It took several years of begging him to not leave a message unless he either a.) had a piece of information he wanted to give me in that message or b.) there was a time sensitivity beyond normal conversation.)
So for each message you wanted to delete, you had to listen to the robotic voice say "Caller, oh, eight, hundred, [pause], seven, etc etc etc, called, today, at, twelve, fifty, seven, PM, [pause]" then the message would start, you wait what you think is the right amount of time before pressing 3 to delete, and if you get it a fraction of a second too early, not only does it not delete it, but it tells you (in those slow, monotic, robot, words) "I'm sorry, but you cannot delete this message until you have listened to at least three seconds." AND THEN IT WOULD START AGAIN FROM THE INTRODUCTION TO WHAT FUCKING NUMBER HAD CALLED AT WHAT TIME.
Man, that's like therapy, writing that out. My mobile number was quite publicly available, included in press releases that were googleble, etc. so I got a fair few spammy voicemails. Thankfully, eventually either I discovered or their system added, the ability (bug) that if you press 3 (the delete button) almost immediately after the end of the robotic words "message deleted", you could time it so the system knew you had already deleted the last message, but hadn't reset the clock for how long you had to listen to the next message for, so once you knew the rhythm you could delete them in about 5 seconds each without being stuck listening.
I used it for a while and the only con---and it is a major con for me---is that, like most innovative or unique MVNOs, it's riding on Sprint. And Sprint is really terrible, at least where I live, which made the service great, except that getting data to work often involved walking around in large circles til I was able to catch an LTE signal.
It rings for some time and then you get some "the user is not available at the moment".
Sometimes I really wonder how the US tech is stuck in the past (while generally is not, of course).
Try dialling ##004# - it's the GSM standard code to disable all conditional call forwarding rules. More codes at https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-4041
I almost never call/sms anyone from my phone, so it costs almost $0/year to run
That's a feature I really want and it's not easy to do.
If you configure a mobile phone line without voicemail, it will not just ring and ring and ring (as I hoped it would) - instead, the caller gets a message that "the number you have dialed is not accepting calls at this time" ... or some other message (depending on the carrier) that makes it sound like you don't pay your phonebill or something.
I want my phone to ring and ring and ring until the caller gives up. I think I can do this with the twilio API, but man that's a lot of work for something (seemingly) simple.
edit: this is the discussion I found that makes me think I could accomplish this with twilio: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/22410430/twilio-respond-t...