VM: Press 1 for More Options.

• Position: Brief Article

Why is "Press 1 to blow you to Kingdom Come!" never given as an option?

There is an uprising in the land. It is Voice Mail Backlash--finally and at last! The calling public is getting fed up with a "technology tool" gone amuck--Voice Mail.

And it's about time.

Actually it is about time. My time, your time--our time spent, wasted, squandered trying to break through the "fire wall" of modern telephony. Some of us saw it coming and predicted it would be a big hassle. I said so in this space in our September 1997 issue. That's when we took the dive and went VM--voice mail! But we also said you'd never get put into the VM tank: Press 1 for Purgatory!

Here, your call is important to us. So important, in fact, that we still answer our phones. You have to ask for VM, and in all honesty, if the person you want to talk to is really out, it usually saves your time if you can leave a VM message. Here we don't use the phony phase: "I'm either away from my desk or on the other line." Balderdash! You just don't want to talk to us. That's where you are!

Impersonal, Insensitive, Infuriating!

How about those businesses that do have a real person as a call director who, when you ask to speak to Joe Bloe, politely dumps you to his VM. Aargh! When that happens you are helplessly/hopelessly deep-sixed.

And another...