Bad news if you don’t fancy paying Telstra $5 a month for its newly-announced iPhone visual voicemail service and don’t think Vodafone is up to the task: Optus says it has no plans for adding the option for its iPhone customers.
Asked if Optus would be introducing visual voicemail for iPhone, a spokesperson told us: “Not at this stage.” Optus is generally reckoned to have the largest concentration of iPhone owners in Australia, in part due to its relatively generous plans, so it’s a potentially annoying omission, but probably not a crucial one. What do you think?
Grim
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 1:45 PMI barely ever get voicemail. If people call me and I miss it, they tend to hang up then SMS me the message.
Tim
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 2:22 PMI switched last year from Virgin to Vodafone and I must admit it’s a nice to have but I’d never say it was worth paying for and I’d never base my decision to go with carrier A or B because of it.
fred
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 2:33 PMI used to get a speech to text converted SMS whenever I got VoiceMail on Optus. I loved it, it was correct 90% of the time and I didn’t have to go and check VoiceMail. Then about 6 months ago Optus took that privilege away from me and made it available for everyone, but charged extra for it. So if Optus were to implement something like this, which they’re not, they’d most likely charge for it just like Telstra
wsDK_II
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 3:48 PMQuiet right – i would assume so as well, everything costs money – almost no one realises this
kellyu
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 2:51 PMI have an Optus phone, and I just use their SurePage service, which has a human being on the other end of the phone who takes the message and sends it to me in a text message. It’s brilliant, and I don’t have to check voicemail.
Blake
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 5:33 PMIs it possible to enable this on three?
Derek Adams-White
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 7:55 PMI hate voicemail but I would like to try out visual voicemail if it is for free. I expect it wont be for free.
Seano Gilbert
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 8:36 PMno one cares about voicemail anymore, and I doubt many people could be bothered with video voicemail.
Bruce
Wednesday, March 23, 2011 at 11:14 PMWhat’s video voicemail?! Try reading the article before you comment
paul
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:21 PMangus, you should have checked first what the story is with vodafone and visual voicemail. your link to the vodafone post is totally outdated: that post is from 2009. i hate beating the drum for vodafone, but visual voicemail is one of the few things that actually work fine for me. btw: telstra charging 5 bucks for it is outrageous and typical for their unjustifiable greed; don’t go for it!
scott white
Wednesday, March 23, 2011 at 3:02 PMfree visual voicemail is the only, i repeat ONLY good thing about vodafone.
Me
Sunday, September 4, 2011 at 11:55 PMThe only thing that kept me with Vodafone so long was Visual Voicemail. I put up with an extra half year of crap in order to keep it! If I’d managed to wait an extra couple of months, I would have switched to Telstra for this feature alone, even at the extra charge. Not being on contract any more, I’m now simply waiting for the iPhone 5, when I look forward to once again have Visual Voicemail, even if it means using Telstra. Oh, and I pretty much manage the iPhones of all my family and friends, so this will be a dozen or more others switching too, all because I miss my VV.
whatsit?
Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at 11:50 AMIt IS worth paying for. I’ve been with Vodafone the last few years and enjoyed visual voicemail. Just switched to Optus thinking it was a standard iPhone feature.
The cost comes because with the VV you can screen voicemail and decide if it’s worth listening to. Optus announces a voicemail and then automatically switches you through to its VM service when you hit the VM button on the iPhone – at the standard 30c a pop. 17 messages a month and that’s your $5 gone.
Bummed
Tuesday, December 6, 2011 at 12:04 PMBummer, I’m with you ‘whatsit?’, I’ve been with AT&T in the States and figured VV was a standard feature. Much easier to navigate when receiving large amounts of VM. Come on Optus!
JS
Sunday, April 8, 2012 at 5:12 AMI have been with o2 in the UK for years and have always has VVM (for free) the fact that Optus are unable or unwilling to provide this service FOC is a bit pathetic really!