One of the original selling points of the original 2G iPhone was the promise of visual voicemail, a way of accessing your voicemail messages on your own terms. In Australia, the only carrier to launch the feature was Vodafone, but it was quite often criticised for messages arriving late or disappearing altogether. But now, according to some online chatter, Telstra is launching the service for NextG iPhones… for just $5 a month.
UPDATE: Telstra have confirmed the service. It’s called MessageBank Plus, and will cost $5 a month. If you want to sign up, here’s how.
It’s worth noting that the service is free on Vodafone, so Telstra’s decision to start charging for it isn’t going to win it any adulation.
Reports say that the service is due to officially launch today, but we haven’t actually received official word from Telstra about it yet – we’ll update with confirmation when we do.
In the meantime the question has to be asked – would you pay $5 a month for visual voicemail?
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Dave Leong
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:07 AMthat totally blows. Telstra already charges a premium for their services and I love their reception but $5 a month is ridiculous
rb
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:17 AM$5 a month? Telstra can die in a fire. When are they going to learn to be competitive? Unfortunately, they get my hard earned because of reception issues with other carriers, but I’m not shelling out extra for this. Very disappointing.
Dave
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:22 AMAnd the answer is HELL NO!
Goddy
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:27 AMOh Telstra, you do something awesome one minute (free international calls to Japan during the disaster), then you pull an absolute dick move like this.
Daniel
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:40 AMMehh, I see it as like buying a Mercedes compared to buying a Commodore. One is better than the other for a reason and therefore they charge more.
Damo
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:43 AMNo, I will not pay for that.
Kelsey Brookes
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:04 AMNope. Telstra, I’m only on your network under sufferance. I won’t pay another cent for the aggravation of having to deal with you.
Smashed
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:20 AMLets face it, Telstra make a small fortune for charging their customers for regular voicemail access, which is why they were never going to give us free visual voicemail.
Seeing as I’m paying about $5 a month to get to my voicemail normally, this is a welcome upgrade, and in the end, will make no difference to my overall bill.
Bring it.
Scott
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:21 AMI dunno, for the amount you end up paying for a call to voicemail anyway. It would be cheaper overall paying the $5.
I was on Vodafone, and leaving Visual Voicemail behind was one of my big worries, I really miss it.
Makes it so easy to track back to that phone number they recitetd, and it was soo cheap, only charging you for data to download the sound file.
But it def should be free.
Martin
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:29 AMI’d rather wait for Optus to finally get visual voicemail
NonATelstraCustomer
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:34 AMTelstra has some nerve charging for this. Apple picked a standard API for accessing ‘visual voicemail’ — iMAP. This is the basis for most voicemail systems worldwide anyway, and will cost telstra nothing to implement.
Voda launched this a few years ago, for free.
Telstra already charges for the voicemail functionaility, and now they want to charge for IMAP access to it? Dont be scammers! You are not AT&T.
Phillo
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:52 AMWell… I dont like the pricing… but the feature is way too good to ignore.
I called Telstra yesterday, requested the product (you have to ask for MessageBank Plus) and within half an our it was active on my phone. They carried accross my existing greeting and any messages that I still hadnt deleted.
Great service and about time Telstra users got it.
Darren Nolan
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 11:05 AMDitch Voice Mail, free voice2txt. It’s more fun than not, because working out what the person originally said in their message to you is usually quite hilarious.
Smashed
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 11:06 AMThe service is called MessageBank Plus, and I’m happy to say it works a treat.
It’s a flat monthly fee of $5, so depending on how much you access yr voicemail, it prob will be no difference on yr overall bill. This is SOOOO much better than the shity old voicemail. Fishing thru 12 old voicemails to get to the one you want is now in the past.
Now if Telstra just upgraded their customer service be on par with their network coverage, it’d be happy days…… :P
Sicarius123
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 11:09 AMGiven Telstra’s “missed call” sms isn’t even capable of appearing to come from the person who’s call I missed, so I get an sms with phone number inside which is a massive pain in the arse, I have doubts this would even work properly, and all the damn messages wouldn’t say I have a missed call from Telstra’s Voicemail number.
Scott
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 11:36 AMhttp://exchange.telstra.com.au/2011/03/22/messagebank-plus-a-new-way-to-dial-up-voicemail-on-apple-iphone/
Simon Reidy
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 2:16 PMI already pay $50 a month and they want an extra 10% for me to access my voicemail from a pretty list? I don’t think so.
Phil
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 3:09 PMAt least we don’t gave to pay to tether like sone carriers OS. I lived in the States for a while and this was one of my favorite iPhone features. I hardly use voicemail as I can’t be bothered listening to 15 messages to get to the message I want. Great feature I’ve been waiting for this.
Nathor777
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 3:27 PMAKKSHULLY… I just enabled it and they told me it’s a set fee of $5 per month PLUS a fee for each 30 second retrieval…
I WAS with voda and i had VVM for free… brrr
gd
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 7:41 PMObviously most of the whinners about just want everything for free! Tell you what bet none of the above are going to go into work tomorrow and say ” Don’t worry about my pay todays work is FREE”
That’s right if you want something it cost money. Most of the people comment on this article probally think their text and visual voice mail is actually worth reading. Bet none of them will publish their last 10 txt just to see the rubbish that they write
Wayne Moore
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 9:44 PMOur company moved its phones from Voda to Telstra last year and I miss visual voicemail. But not enough to pay $5 a month for it. Get real Telstra. And while you’re at it, get with this century.
Stew
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 at 10:42 PMSod you, Telstra. I like Vodafail’s *free* Visual Voicemail which works a treat… usually. You kknow – when their data network is up & running. Which these days is pretty seldom.
Not sure what my point here was…
Oh yeah! Don’t be a dick, Telstra! In this day & age it should be bloody well free.
Bryce
Wednesday, March 23, 2011 at 12:11 AMWhy should we pay for a feature that comes with the phone?
David
Wednesday, March 23, 2011 at 2:09 AMI’d consider paying, but I’m pre-paid, not on a plan, so I dont get the choice yet as it is only available to those on a plan.
I dont ever want to go back on a plan as pre-paid is cheaper and gives me better value based on my calling needs
Michael Robinson
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 8:03 PMNot for $5/month. What a waste of an implementation.