In fact, an unnecessary tip to all you highly-qualified over-achievers:

When leaving a message, give your phone number, then say, "I'll give you that number again at the end of this message," then talk for a little bit. That they know that if they scramble for a pencil, it will pay off, and they won't have to play to your stupid message again.

people still have phones that don't remember numbers for them?

They're from the nineties. They're called landlines.

I'm having a real problem with phone numbers now that I'm supposed to teach them to PK for safety's sake. I don't know my phone #, which makes the task a li'l difficult.

Or they're calling from an office where their direct number is 999-1234 but the company PBX will make the caller ID show up as 999-1000.

Also? We do not have time to sit and listen while you go "uhh... oh yeah.... and another thing." Leave a short message.

Actually, I got so tired of sitting there with a pencil and paper waiting while some recording went "uuhhh" I disabled my work voicemail.

Slol, the day I hit the lottery, I'm going to do that even before I hand in my resignation.

Do it now. Tell 'em it's broken.

I just tell everyone that if they want to reach me, use email, b/c I check my voicemail *maybe* once a week.

I managed to go 6 months here without knowing the VM password to the phone in my office. It was blissful.

I once had the pleasure of retrieving 70 company voicemails. I f*ing hate voicemail.

bitchphd has the right of it though, it is far, far easier to sort out (or triage) email.

Truer words have never been spoken.

The organization I work for has a despised policy--but I actually like it--that no one is allowed to have voicemail. The idea is that everyone is responsible for answering a ringing phone (if it rings more than twice you should answer even if it's not yours), and callers will always have a human being answer their call.

everyone is responsible for answering a ringing phone

Ditto here, but a human can still send someone to voicemail if the callee isn't around.

Is it wrong to aspire to a desk without a phone?

I have no phone at work.

voicemail is awful, waiting thro a 2 minute message of detours and irrelevant info to hear a number. People should send emails if the other person isn't at their phone.

Eh. Sometimes it's not time to put something in writing yet but you do want the person to know what you need to talk to them about. Hence voicemail. But yes, best to say the number slowly and clearly and then repeat it slowly and clearly.

Is it wrong to aspire to a desk without a phone?

That sounds dreamy to me.

Can we not all agree on the miracle of the Poorman?

18: I've already noticed this tendancy among my friends. No one leaves a voicemail anymore, they'll just send a text message if you don't answer. It's a good system, especially since it forces economy on the messager.

Can we not all agree on the miracle of the Poorman?

That latest post is fantastic.

As long as I'm trawling through blogs we all read anyway, I note that KSK weighs in on an important issue among the Unfogged community:

We're a bunch of white dudes writing this blog (Sorry, Unsilent Majority: Jewish is white).

At the very least, say your name, your phone number, and THEN your message. That way, if you are a "detour talker," one has the option of deleting while still being able to call you back.

That's what I do -- Name, phone number, rambling incoherent message with a whole bunch of stammering, and then repeat the phone number.

I'm with 22. Text-messaging is the best. Nine times out of ten, it even beats the other person answering the phone and having to talk to them.

The minimalist etiquette is the best, too. No formalities.

I occasionally leave messages in limerick form.

you could also leave
a message in haiku and
no one would notice.

24: Yeah, that's what you like about that KSK post.

comments can also be Limericks
cast gently not to offend the chicks
but that would be daft
for here At The Mineshaft
yhe jokes are primarily 'bout dicks

24: Yeah, that's what you like about that KSK post.

I read it for the sports analysis.

One of my big pet peeves. Of course, when someone does that to me, I simply don't return their call.

For several years I was happily employed at an organization in which no one cared that my voicemail message informed callers that I did not respond to voicemail messages and preferred email. Sadly this is no longer the case, but, since my department has a pretty determined anti-voicemail bias, I usually just get post-it note messages if someone else can't deal with the caller.

Who, exactly, is this ubiquitous ogged fellow? I seem to recall someone from long ago -- fogged, perhaps? Iranian, I think he was -- who posted almost this much and nearly this schizophrenically, only to announce that he was retiring.

I drifted away, drifted back and away again, and now return to find it's as if nothing has ever changed, except that uberpedant w-lfs-n is suddenly on the front page.

And we call this progress?

I don't see anyone calling it progress.

sigh. I'm afraid leaving voicemails is my bread and butter. I try to say the number twice, and make sure I say it differently the second time, to clear up ambiguity, but I like the at the start and at the end technique. But i'm sad everyone despises voicemails so much.

Thankfully, the trend of leaving "cute" or "funny" outgoing messages has mostly passed, but I still occasionally run into one that is annoying (at least after the first hearing) or too long, and usually both. These often take the form of the callee recording their adorable three-year old babbling for something approaching 15 minutes before you hear the blissful sound of the beep. I mean, babbling kids are indeed adorable, but I just wanna f$%king leave you a message. Today. Goddammit.

I try to say the number twice, and make sure I say it differently the second time

I do that too. 323-555-1234 + message + 232-555-1324. Drives people bug-fuck crazy.

38: What's worse is when you think you know the code for bypassing the message, and you don't. On some systems you can press # to skip the message. On others, that will bounce you out of the mailbox and you have to start over. Argh.

Yeah, to clarify, I leave a fair amount of voicemails every day, and try to slow it down and enuciate the numbers very clearly. Although I would be morally justified in runningallthewordstogether and, umm, leaving, like, long, umm, pauses? an' speakin' in a pyeculiyar accssent, while using the speaker phone and conducting another, much more fucking profane conversation at the same fucking time.

I hate the telephone.

I hate the telephone, too. At Stanley, Inc., it's suggested that our outgoing messages include lots of information (phone numbers, URLs, the weights and dimensions of several marsupials, etc.). I'm required to have that message in Spanish and English, making the message all the longer. It is a rare instance when someone bothers to listen through all that to leave a message.

I don't see any distinction being made between calls made to someone you don't know or don't know very well (am I right that that's mostly what's under discussion here?) and calls made to friends or friend-like entities -- am I right in thinking you would mainly leave messages including a phone number in the first case, and that people in the second classification should generally be expected to know your number or to have it at easy access? You guys are all talking about your work telephones (or in Matt's case lack thereof) and I guess you would get a lot of the first kind of calls at your work phones. But I hardly ever get a message on my work voice mail that is not from my wife. (Who knows my number and vice versa.) Sometimes I guess from a HR department or something like that but not enough for it to turn into an annoyance.

I think that's why the post is directed at "office drones", clownaest. Personal VM is totally different: fewer rules and generally much more welcome.

42: But isn't the point of the long voicemail recording to discourage the leaving of actual messages? It sounds like you don't need to check your voicemails often at Stanley, Inc, which is an enviable situation.

Especially since Large Midwestern University recently changed its voicemail system so that you get Twenty! Gazillion! Options! when checking voicemail. Would you like to call the caller? Why bother dialing when you can listen to a list of options and hit a number followed by the pound sign? Do you want to use your telephone to send the caller a fax with an attached voicemail message? How about a fax without an attached voicemail message? And you certainly need to hear contact information for the office that manages the telephones, because it's much easier to hear it every time than to look it up when you need it. And now you can also do some kind of incredibly baroque procedure (which I refuse to learn) which involves checking your voicemail over the intertubes--and you certainly want to be reminded of that every time you check or leave a message!

38: A relative's home message: "You've reached ###-####. If you've called to part fools from their money, shame on you! Otherwise, please leave your message after the tone."

At the new office, I do not know how (a) to record an outgoing message or (b) to check new messages. I asked a co-worker how to do these things and she was not sure; I take this as a positive sign. (Although it would be nice for my Ellen, if she could leave me messages and have them get received.)

The phone registration system at my undergraduate institution - at every step prompted you, "If this is not correct, press 1 now." In other words, if everything was fine you had to sit there while time expired on your window of opportunity. (Drove me batty.)

isn't the point of the long voicemail recording to discourage the leaving of actual messages?

Just don't tell mi jefe, mmkay?

Just don't tell mi jefe, mmkay?

Okay, I promise not to.

What's your jefe's name and contact number?

you mean "office worker bees". "Office drones" would not leave voicemails as they have no other function than to fertilise the office queen.