The other day someone sent in a question and asked why they should pay for a service like PhoneTag when Verizon’s Visual Voicemail is free? This is a fair question and deserves an honest answer.
Visual Voicemail
The first thing you need to keep in mind is that Verizon’s Visual Voicemail and PhoneTag, although related, are very different types of services. Visual Voicemail is basically a GUI interface that allows you to see a visual reprsentation of your voicemail messages that you have in your voicemail cue. Think of how email comes into your inbox. Email meessages are displayed in the order that you received them, however, you can read them in whatever order you like.
Visual Voicemail, like with your email inbox, gives you the ability to listen to your messages in whatever order you desire as compared to sequentially like with standard voice mail systems. Visual Voicemail is visual in the sense that you are able to see whom a voicemail is from before you actually listen to it.
PhoneTag
To make a long post a little shorter, PhoneTag can do all that stuff up above, however, that is where the similarity ends.
What makes PhoneTag special is that that not only does it allow you see who voicemail messages are from before you listen to them, it truly makes your voicemail visual by transcribing the voicemail message and presenting you with a text representation of the voicemail itself.
When someone sends you a voicemail, you don’t have to see who it from and then listen to it… Going back to the email inbox analogy, you can simply read the voicemail like you would the email. What is even cooler is that you can respond back to the voicemail via an email or text message.
PhoneTag is one sweet application for your BlackBerry but you don’t have to take my word for it. They offer and 7-day free trial, however, that isn’t really long enough for you to test it out so we’ve set up a 30-day free trial of PhoneTag just for RIMarkable readers.
I have a Blackberry Storm on the Verizon network. It came with Visual Voicemail preinstalled, however, when I went to set it up I was directed to a browser page that notified me it would cost 2.99 per month to use. You say here that its free. What’s the deal?
Robb,
Thanks for the great post. I believe that you do have to pay for Verizon Visual Voicemail as Drew points out above but regardless your overall thesis remains the same. Their Visual Voicemail has really nothing to do with what we offer, all they allow you to do is to access your audible message faster.
It is always nice to read articles that are written from people who look beyond the buzz words. Too often I hear, “Verizon now offers your product” and as you point out above they just don’t.
Jamie
You have to pay for it, and better yet, it’s flawed. VZ is working on it with RIM. Try listening to the message in Visual Voice Mail without the speaker on…it’s extremely low. After further testing, VZW techs found the same issue. So, the only way you can hear the message is by having the speaker on. And if for any reason you do hear the message loud and clear without the speaker on, it won’t last for long with further adjustments. We actually got it going, only to have it drop the volume.
Not sure if anyone has this other issue…speed dial on mine no longer has volume when dialing, so I don’t know if the call is actually being dialed. And when it does connect, my Bluetooth then drops the volume, but yet it’s still connected to the device. I have to turn the Bluetooth headset off and back on in order to use it on voice calls.
The Storm is driving me crazy with these bugs. I’m thinking of going back to my Pearl until they straighten out all the issues.
The reason I got my first Blackberry was so that I could use Phonetag to its best advantage. It is absolutely my favorite tech application. I no longer know how I managed my office without it. Well, yes, I do know — badly.
Elaine Dowling
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
I stand corrected. I guesst that Verizon decided not to offer it for free after all.
I loved PhoneTag on my 8703 and 8830 but now I cant get it to work on the Storm. I hope ope they update it soon. I miss it. This VVM is nothing like Phonetag.
Phonetag not working here either. Shame, too.
VZN ninjas are preparing more hidden fees for your service plan. Channel 5 News film at 11.
Although listening to voicemails from within the Phonetag BlackBerry app is hit or miss, the transcriptions and notifications that voicemails have been received seem to still work ok for me.
I really hope that Phonetag comes out with BlackBerry Storm update soon. Not doing so opens the door a little for their competition.
Hey everyone. My name is Michael Manna and I represent Phonefusion. We have a TOTALLY FREE visual voicemail app called Fusion Voicemail Plus and it’s compatible with Blackberry as well as Windows Mobile and Android.
I will be doing a video with FVM Plus loaded on the Storm as soon as I get one shipped which, unfortunately, is still after 12/17.
For now, if you want to try it, you can visit http://www.fvmplus.com and check out the video I did with the Blackberry Curve at http://www.youtube.com/phonefusion.
If there’s any questions, feel free to email support@phonefusion.com.
Thanks,
Michael
It doesn’t seem like it does a transcript like PhoneTag. Am I correct.
I have to say that phone tag is very cool. And since I returned my Storm which was a pretty useless phone and have my curve back this will come in handy.
Thanks
Jeff
I have the free Fusion Voicemail and love it. When I got the Storm and found out that I had to pay for Verzion’s Visual Voicemail, I went on the net looking for something that was free. I found Fusion and just love it. By the way, hated the Storm. Returned it and went back to my Curve.
Not sure if anyone has tried out the VZW Visual Voicemail, but it has bugs, at least a couple I’ve noticed. Without the speaker on setting, you can barely hear the message, even with the volume key maxed out. Also, after receiving and playing a VVM, the BB red light will continue to blink even though all messages have been checked. Either have to wait it out for 30 minutes to a couple of hours, or pull the battery to remove the blinking red light.
Ah, these new toys…
How about Youmail? I use it and it’s free. The funniest part is that you can set a greeting for each individual caller and they have a huge library of hilarious greetings. You can also use the greeting to ward off that stalker or person who keeps calling you. just set the greeting to the “this line has been disconnected” greeting. Just another choice I guess.
Phone tag is really cool, I usually use it everyday. It gives me satisfaction in my doing, at least it can help manage my busy schedule. To play NBa, to make Chat with other ppoeple!