Voice Mail Hell

I'd just like to rant for a minute about how there isn't a standard voice mail system in this country. Hell, there's not a standard system in the (admittedly very large) company I work for. I don't do a whole lot of calling, but when I do, I'm usually in a hurry and need to work down a list of people within a fairly short period of time. Therefore, it's not part of the plan that I should erase the voice mail message I just left. Yet, because of the way voice mail systems are configured, that's exactly what happens on occasion.

This came home to me this morning when I was calling my dentist to inquire WHY I'd gotten a phone call about a dental appointment I'd cancelled back on Tuesday. I left the message, which admittedly was a bit scattered since I couldn't remember my home telephone number (I don't call myself). Of course, there are no instructions about what to do at the end of your message. So, based on my experience at work, I pressed star (*).

The recorded voice said, "Message erased." I cursed a blue streak before the recording beeped again. I left a new message, admittedly more coherent, and pressed the pound (#) key. That got me into the message options menu and I pressed to send (1) with normal delivery (1). But I was grinding my teeth the whole time, which, since this was the dentist, may have been the intended result. (Actually, the dentist is a lovely guy with a nice chairside manner, so much so that I didn't feel like I needed to go with the gas while he was working on me.)

I wonder how many man-hours are wasted by people having to rerecord messages because voice mail systems do not have the same sets of commands? Of course, the solution is to get a live human every time, but we're all busy and that's not exactly what happens.