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Comment by dymk

1 year ago

> Don't accept them until they start talking.

Not professional, not an option for some calls.

> If people can't be bothered to leave a message, then that's their problem.

It's actually my problem if I miss an important call. A message is great, sure, but I still missed the call.

> Not professional, not an option for some calls.

Callers can't (well, shouldn't) expect to be able to reach you immediately by calling you. There's a lot of valid reasons to not answer your phone. You might be driving, you might be in the bathroom, you might be getting lunch in a noisy place, you might be in the middle of a different important conversation, etc.

At which point the caller needs to realize that the "professional" thing to do is leave a message if they want to be called back. (Or try calling again later.) Because there's enough junk calls that expecting people to call back every missed call that didn't leave a message is just unreasonable.

My phone shows a live transcription of the message being left.

If I see that it's an important call, then I can pick up and answer right there mid-voicemail.

That's what I was referring to. They start talking when they leave the voicemail.

This is how we did it for a long time with home answering machines too. Except instead of reading a live transcription, you listened to their live recording, and could interrupt it and answer if you wanted to talk to them. It's not a new idea.

  • That relies on people leaving a message, which not everybody does.

    And not everybody has a phone that'll do this live message transcribing.

    And no, everybody who decides to not leave a message isn't "not worth your time" or something.