A pet peeve...short and sweet

[friendofjimmyk]

I dispise rude outgoing voicemail messages. I really do. I just called a member whose voicemail snapped, "You KNOW who you called! Leave a message!" It doesn't look like much typed out - but her tone was VERY rude.

Really? C'mon! Do you job hunt with that outgoing message? Is that the only number people reach you at...friends, family, professionals? I believe it speaks A LOT of someone's personality when their outgoing message is crap!

Another pet peeve...long voicemail instructions. You know, the person leaves their outgoing message and then the automated phone system comes on and says, "To leave a message, press 1 or wait for the tone. To leave a callback number, press 5. When you are finished, hang up or press pound for more options" Do we really still need that? Why don't all companies give you the option to have your voicemail not play that and if your company does - DON'T PLAY IT!

[chainedbarista]

wow, that is pretty rude; bet she doesn't get many calls with that gem.

i also hate long call instructions; half the time, i just hang up.

[MoxisPilot]

I don't leave voicemail anymore unless I absolutely -must-, because I'm tired of the downright nasty or long messages people have.

[Ironclad Alibi]

Another pet peeve...long voicemail instructions.

At one job I had we were required to leave a specific voice mail message which gave our weekly work schedules. Speaking in a normal voice, the message was longer than the 30 seconds preferred by the voice mail system. I had to talk real fast to get the entire message recorded. But the first thing I said after identifying myself was "push the # key to skip to recording your message or wait for the beep." That way callers had the option of not listening to all the BS I had to record.

[laundryhater]

I hate the ones who pretend they answered and then after a pause say to leave a message.

"Hello. Hello? Oh, no one's available to take your call right now. Please leave a message."

And I fall for it every single frickin time and start introducing myself again thinking they just didn't hear me the first time. Then feel stupid & mad when I realize it's just a recording and they're mean for making me think otherwise!

[raw456]

What annoys me is people who will spend 5 minutes leaving you a very detailed message and then rush thru their phone number at the speed of light right at the end. My work voicemail doesnt have a fast forward option so you have to listen to the WHOLE message 4 or 5 times to make sure you get their contact number.

My other pet peeve is the ones who leave me a message, usually cause I'm on another call at the time, then call me back 5-10 mins later and complain I hadn't called them back yet. WTF?

[pile of monkeys]

I have to make about 50-100 confirmation calls a day, and the absolute worst voicemail offenses (figure I hear each one at least 3 or 4 times daily, some more than that):
1. Too many rings until voicemail picks up. 4? Fine. 6? Pushing it. 10? Totally unacceptable.
2. The "Please enjoy the music while your party is being reached." Whatever song you've chosen, it sucks. Trust me.
3. Allowing your pre- or barely-verbal children to record an approximately 20 minute long, completely unintelligible outgoing message. It's not cute. No one thinks it's cute except you.
4. Anything in which you're singing.
5. I know you can't help it, but the cell phone "press 5 to leave a callback number," etc. It just takes forever.
6. The fake, "Hello?.... I'm not here!" Nyuk nyuk. Thanks for wasting my time.

and an honorable mention for this one, which is not voicemail, but a very common phone answering phenomenon: Our (female) desk staff calls to confirm a man's appointment. The wife answers. We ask for the man. The wife gets irate. "NO, he's NOT here! Can I HELP you? I'm his WIFE!" Lady, your husband's mistress is probably not calling the home number in the middle of the day asking for him. Dial back the paranoia a bit, okay?

[freeatlast]

We have a customer who we have to call quite frequently, as her account is ALWAYS severely past due. At the beginning of the outgoing message, she belches really loud. And as she is working up this nastly belch, she sounds like she is going to puke. Then she goes on to say "It's Miller time. What you doin callin now - pimps only work from 9 to 9:30." Then she lists all the types of alcohol she and her friends, family, hell who knows are drinking at the moment. Then she ends the message with another really disgusting belch.

Then, when you leave a message for her to call back, she calls in yelling about how she "don't owe us a penny!" We all just love dealing with this nice, young lady.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

We have a customer who we have to call quite frequently, as her account is ALWAYS severely past due. At the beginning of the outgoing message, she belches really loud. And as she is working up this nastly belch, she sounds like she is going to puke. Then she goes on to say "It's Miller time. What you doin callin now - pimps only work from 9 to 9:30." Then she lists all the types of alcohol she and her friends, family, hell who knows are drinking at the moment. Then she ends the message with another really disgusting belch.

Then, when you leave a message for her to call back, she calls in yelling about how she "don't owe us a penny!" We all just love dealing with this nice, young lady.

There must be many, many things wrong with me, because I think I would get a kick out of that.

Enough even to look forward to calling this person. "I'm going to call the belch lady now!"

Oh well, at least you know where all her money is going.

[bainsidhe]

"Hello. Hello? Oh, no one's available to take your call right now. Please leave a message."

And I fall for it every single frickin time and start introducing myself again thinking they just didn't hear me the first time. Then feel stupid & mad when I realize it's just a recording and they're mean for making me think otherwise!

Okay, yes. I admit it. I once had a message just like this and yes, I found it funny. I once won a TV from a radio station and was listening do said station when...

DJ: Let's call the winner! (ring ring)
Phone: Hello? Hello?
Me: (sigh, I didn't win)
DJ: Yes, is this...
Phone: Ha, no one's at home right now, please leave a message after the beep (beeeeep)
DJ: Wait, wha? Was that a message? Hello? Hmmm
Me: Whee! That was my phone!!! I won!!!

Yeah, I now know it's a horrible message and the DJs were not amused. And yet.......twas awesome. I'll admit, this is probably the only time I will consider this amusing. Just thought I'd share.

[bean]

Another pet peeve...long voicemail instructions. You know, the person leaves their outgoing message and then the automated phone system comes on and says, "To leave a message, press 1 or wait for the tone. To leave a callback number, press 5. When you are finished, hang up or press pound for more options" Do we really still need that? Why don't all companies give you the option to have your voicemail not play that and if your company does - DON'T PLAY IT!

You just described Sprint's wireless phone voicemail. The default behavior anyway, if you don't go into the settings.

They give you the option to turn off the instructions in the voicemail setup, but it's buried pretty deep. I have Sprint and turned that nonsense off years ago, now you just get the almost as annoying "You have reached the voicemail of ###-###-####" default greeting from Sprint. I'm too lazy to record a real message.

[Fox One]

Usually pressing, "1" skips past any pre-recorded carrier instructions ("To leave a message, press...") and straight to that little beep that signifies the recording has started. It even skips past most caller's self-recorded messages ("Hey! Sorry I'm not in right now...") as well.

[Andara Bledin]

What annoys me is people who will spend 5 minutes leaving you a very detailed message and then rush thru their phone number at the speed of light right at the end. My work voicemail doesnt have a fast forward option so you have to listen to the WHOLE message 4 or 5 times to make sure you get their contact number.

The bosslady at work hates those with a red-hot passion for precisely that reason. I always make a point to identify myself and leave my number at the beginning of all messages, and then give my name and number again at the end so that nobody has to re-listen if they were paying attention the first time.

1. Too many rings until voicemail picks up. 4? Fine. 6? Pushing it. 10? Totally unacceptable.
2. The "Please enjoy the music while your party is being reached." Whatever song you've chosen, it sucks. Trust me.

1) I get this a lot from businesses. I can't imagine how much business they lose because people don't feel like waiting half an hour until your voice mail system picks up.
2) That song you like? It sucks. A truism from another site I visit.
I've never done any of that. My message has always been a short and sweet, "You've reached the Bledin household. We can't take your call right now, so please leave a message and we'll get back to you," or the one time where I wrote a script and recorded the message in tandem with my then-hubby with some creepy music in the background. It sounded rather disturbing in a haunted house sort of way.

We had one friend swear to never ever call us again just on the chance he might encounter the message again.

^-.-^

[Kogarashi]

One of my personal annoyances is when people leave excruciatingly long voicemail messages for you (especially when, as someone else mentioned, they leave all the useful stuff like phone numbers at the end of said message).

One of Hubby's relatives is notorious for talking a lot when on the phone with people, such that you can tell when someone is listening to her because they have the phone to their ear but haven't said anything for five minutes or more. (She does this in person too, but somehow it's a little less annoying.) She just has very roundabout ways of saying things, and goes into lots of detail on her way to making a point.

Once, this relative called our landline (when we still had one) and left a message on the machine. Strike that. She left two messages, because she completely filled up the alloted space for the first one, and nearly got cut off on the second one too (after calling back and explaining how she'd gotten cut off by the answering machine). I can't even recall what she was calling about, just that it apparently required such detail that she needed to fill up two answering machine messages to leave it. And no, I don't believe she really got to the point until the end of the second message.

You just described Sprint's wireless phone voicemail. The default behavior anyway, if you don't go into the settings.

Huh, didn't know there was an option to turn it off in the settings. But Sprint at least has that "to leave a message, press 1" right at the beginning. I know several people on other carriers that don't have any helpful way to skip the long instructions set.

[tropicsgoddess]

If that message was left for me and that person was job hunting, here's what would happen: <BEEP!> " Message Deleted. "