Visual Voicemail

[Stuarticus]

Is visual voicemail on the cards for roll out?

It still irks me that o2 are the only network to offer this.

[dannyboy2000]

I've never even heard of visual voicemail and would be interested to hear what it is all about. As others have mentioned, it's obviously not that popular or Vodafone would have jumped on the bandwagon. Sponsoring Mclaren is bound to be a multi million pound deal. Well, more of an investment as there is great coverage and expands their brand globally. You could say that about all large companies that advertise. Speculate to accumulate. Mobile is a very competitive market, you have to push forward. Mclaren obviously gets them more business than visual voicemail would bring in.

[chrisdeeming1]

B19JAD, I'm not sure you could ever say that the iPhone is not fit for the intended purpose.

If the purpose of the phone is to make calls, send texts, browse the internet, receive emails and receive voicemail then it certainly does fit those purposes.

Visual Voicemail is not a purpose. It is a feature. Without that feature it is still possible to receive your voicemail therefore all intended purposes of the iPhone are still catered for.

In the example you mentioned above, Amazon would be required by law to give a refund as they, as the seller, advertised it with that feature. If that feature is removed then it is more than reasonable to expect Amazon to provide a refund.

At no point has Vodafone ever advertised that they support the feature, so they would be in absolutely no way responsible for that feature not being supported.

You could argue that Vodafone should advertise that they don't support this feature, but what company does advertise what they don't support?

I can't make toast in my kettle, but I'm not about to complain to Kenwood because they didn't tell me that before I bought it.

[B19JAD]

The ability of the PS3 to run Linux is a not a purpose it's a feature and a PS3 not having this ability does not mean that you can see a PS3 is not fit for purpose. The point I was trying to make is that visual voicemail is a feature of the iphone link the ability to run Linux is a feature of the PS3. Without it there could be some re-course as vodafone have in effect via their network setup removed a feature of the iphone that was there when you bought it in the same way the ability to run linux was suddently not supported by Sony.

The fact you can still receive voicemail has no bearing as the specfici function is visual voicemail.

Having come from O2 to vodafone recently I am amazed that it is not supported and if I had known at the time I would not have switched networks

[stewartna777]

Hi,

I think the lesson here is that if you want the full functions of the Iphone join O2.

If not, stick with your existing carrier.

Regards,

Neil

[camperdown9]

Hi

My understanding is that it cost O2 a fortune to implement visual voicemail, and that they only did so in order to sercure the exclusive rights to sell iPhone in the UK for a set period of time. 

Orange France and T-Mobile Germany did the same thing. I don't think you will ever see Orange, T-Mobile, Vodafone or 3 introducing VVM in the UK. 

My advise would be to download the Hullomail app. It does pretty much the same thing.

Alex

[Boardmanmtb]

This is correct, whilst having visual voicemail (VVM) is very handy it was only implimented by O2 at Apples request.

VVM works in the same way email does. The phone simply polls the network database to see if a new message is available and if so, makes it available to listen to.

Whilst Vodafone could implement it do you think it is worth the extra money they will undoubtbly have to add to our packages/phone prices?

[zoara]

I'd pay extra for it.

In fact, the sole reason I'm here is because my O2 reception at my new office is terrible, and while looking into how alternative networks fare here, I've discovered we have "a Vodafone box in the roof" which means full 3G signal. But then I looked and... still no Visual Voicemail on Vodafone. Tsk. It's actually a pretty tough decision because despite getting frustrated with O2's reception here, I'm not sure I can go back to those horrible, horrible audio-menu voicemail systems.

No, HulloMail doesn't cut it - I've tried. If I was happy with a tacked-on experience I'd have gone with an Android device. The reason I bought an iPhone was because it's a slick and well thought-out experience.

And yes, I have experienced Vodafone's voicemail menus, so I'm not judging it on O2's menus or anything like that. I've hated audio menus since I first started using mobile phones fifteen years ago so Visual Voicemail was a godsend. And I've even had a job designing voicemail menus, so I'm aware how difficult it is to do it well (and how many companies insist on X Y and Z that make the experience customer-hostile). In my opnion, Visual Voicemail is "how it should be done", full stop.

I'd be prepared to pay for Visual Voicemail on Vodafone. I wouldn't have to decide between decent reception and decent voicemail features. At times I was effectively doing this anyway - I could have moved to cheaper tariffs (with the same minutes/data/texts) on other networks but the lack of Visual Voicemail stopped me. Now it's not just about price, but about reception as well, so it's a different question.

If Vodafone had Visual Voicemail I'd have changed months ago, when I first started working in this building. 

[jeffkinn]

Have you tried On Voicefeed - a better experience that Hullomail and allows contacts to be grouped with customised greetings for each group. And a group can be one person.

Vodafone will probably never roll out VV - nor will the other networks. Surely a decent signal so you can make and receive calls is more important that built in VV as opposed to an excellent VV app that replaces normal voicemail with a much better experience?

[Stuarticus]

I wouldn't say that VF will never have it. Random access voicemail is the future on smartphones. Audio navigation is almost prehistoric by VV standards. When other handset makers start supporting it en masse the other non-VV networks will take note.

[jeffkinn]

OK - obviously not a literal never but not anytime soon. Personally I would rather see investment in improving the 3G network or preparing for 4G.