[Mark Rejhon]

Voice-To-Text Voicemail services
& 3rd Party Alpha Pager Dispatch services;

Ever wished you could read your voicemail instead of listen to voicemails, and also not need to write things down from voicemails? Or remember the old days of alphanumeric pagers? Where someone could call and a text message can get dispatched? These services are almost gone nowadays with the proliferation of cellphones. Cellphones have pretty much replaced pagers.

However, some of us like incoming phone calls to be converted to text messages. Some of us are deaf and prefer to read messages rather than listen to messages. Other people get over 50 voicemail messages daily and would love a secretary to transcribe all the voicemail messages to text messages because humans can read faster than listen. So there's a demand for such a transcription or dispatch service.

But alphanumeric dispatch is hard to find. The good news: Third party dispatch services can now be purchased today that works on any email-capable wireless device. Which means you've got a permanent "pager number" or "voicemailbox number" that gets dispatched to your BlackBerry or whatever wireless handheld you get in the future.

People can call my phone number directly. It acts like a normal voice mail box. Nobody knows it's a special voicemail box. What's different is that an operator immediately transcribes all messages and sends an email transcription of all my voicemails within 2 minutes of receiving each voicemail message. That means I can READ my voicemail instead of LISTEN to my voicemail. Pretty convenient, it's just like good old fashioned alphanumeric dispatch except most people are more comfortable leaving a message on voicemail instead of with a paging operator. I don't even need to explain to other people that I am deaf, they can call my business at my own 877 number and all incoming voicemail messages are automatically converted to text by the DictoMaiil operators;

Although I use DictoMail, there is more than 1 company that does the same thing. Costs are between $18 per month and $50 per month, depending on number of messages or even unlimited messages. And you can still check your voicemails normally if you wish, listen to them normally. (This is purely optional)

They can also be used to safely dictate your emails while driving too -- you speak into your voicemail and you automatically receive a transcription of the voicemail! It's just simply leaving a long spoken message on a voicemail box, it's like having an invisible secretary typing your spoken message. Then you can later just forward the resulting email message to intended recipient;

All the below works on all known carriers, including AT&T, TMobile, Cingular, Verizon, Rogers, etc. The only requirement is that the device supports email, wireless and/or non-wireless.

Listing Of Services

• DictoMail by Admiral - www.dictomail.com
  This provides a voicemail box with your own personal 877 toll-free phone number. All voicemail messages are converted to text and sent to your email address (BlackBerry). This toll free number works from the entire North America.
  
• PhoneWire Voicemail - www.phonewire.com/voicemail/
  This also provides a voicemail box with your own personal 877 toll-free phone number. All voicemail messages are converted to text and sent to your email address (BlackBerry).
  
• PhoneWire Messaging - www.phonewire.com/messaging/
  This provides an alphanumeric dispatch style service; can use any email addresses. Good if you want more traditional style alphanumeric paging that's 100% device-independent (just need an email capable device)
  
• SpinVox - www.spinvox.com
  A voice to text service located in the UK. These appear to have prices targeted at individuals and light users, but are limited to European users (unless you go through a number of workarounds - such as forwarding a U.S. phone number to an European voice mailbox, and using email mode instead of SMS mode). They also have a Speak-A-Blog service, which allows you to make a phone call to your blog and it gets converted to text for your blog.
  
• Jott - www.jott.com
  A new voice to text service designed to allow you to dictate a message to be sent to someone. Currently a free service.
  
• My IP Relay Number
  This is a free service for deaf users, as a value-added enhancement to a relay service. This provides you a phone number with voicemail-style transcription. A callcenter employee answers incoming calls to your phone number, and types down your message to send to an email, or realtime relay (if you are signed onto AIM). Not very reliable and you always get a different voice (and accent) for incoming calls, so not very-businesslike. However, it's great for deaf people who can't afford the above options.
  
• SimulSays Visual Voicemail
  A service that claims to provide "visual voicemail" to BlackBerry, ala iPhone style. Some of the other services above can already do the same thing by putting your voicemails into your BlackBerry Messages list, but SimulSays goes further by providing better integration through a software client that is similiar to Apple iPhone's Visual Voicemail.

Other Advantages

• Transcription of voicemails to text emails;
• Caller-ID of callers is added to the top of the emails;
• It's faster to read transcriptions of 50 voicemails than to listen to 50 voicemails;
• Multiple people can call and leave a message simultaneously;
• Your own personal 877 number; No PIN's, no extensions, no calling instructions needed;
• You can use Call Forwarding to have a local number instead of an 877 number;
• You can use No-Answer Call Forwarding to make this your default voicemail instead of your carrier's voicemail;
• Can broadcast the transcribed text message to multiple email addresses;
• Never need to call your voicemail box; but you can call in and listen if you want;
• For messages scrambled or not successfully transcribed; you can simply call the voicemail box and listen to it;
• Adds something similiar to an alphanumeric paging service on ANY BlackBerry or wireless email device; works even if your carrier doesn't provide any paging services;
• Have the same voicemail phone number even if you switch carriers;
• Great for deaf and hard of hearing;
• Great for people who get too much voicemail;
• Great for being able to print out important voicemails;
• Great for dictation; safely transcribing your own emails while driving; just call your voicemailbox and speak the message.
• Make permanent backups easy; never lose a phone number from an old voicemail;
• Never need to delete voicemails again if you don't want to;
• Easy to copy-and-paste phone numbers from voicemails to your addressbook;
• Easy to dial phone numbers embedded in email transcription of voicemail messages simply by clicking on the phone number on Blackberry;
• No need to explain the service to others; it just acts like a normal voicemail box;

This is a "Mark Rejhon BlackBerry FAQ" article.
Copyright (C) 2005 by Mark Rejhon, All Rights Reserved. Some portions may be Copyright (C) by respective forum members.
Mark Rejhon grants permission to use this article only for private use. For all other uses, please ask Mark Rejhon at Mark Rejhon - aka Marky - Home Page of Mark D. Rejhon to ask for permission to use this article. If any content of this article also contains content by other forum members, please ask them for permission too as well. This includes commercial use, public use, reposting in full/part anywhere on the Internet, publication in magazine/book or any other media, or any other use than private use. This copyright notice may not be edited or removed in any manner. Mark Rejhon reserves exclusive right to edit, remove, or restore this article, and this article may not be edited, removed, or restored by any other individual or organizations.

[Mark Rejhon]

By the way, I use Dictomail. Does anybody here use Phonewire?

[KendallParis]

I am going to start using Phonemail in November. I did a demo last night and it appears to be very, very good.

[mull3992]

[FONT=Tahoma][SIZE=7][COLOR=Blue]

I've been trying to contact Dictomail. After all the positive publicity I've read on this forum, I'm ready to sign up. But doesn't look like anybody's minding the store. Tried Google - none of the links worked. One link I used from this website told me I wasn't authorized to see the page. Anybody know what's going on??

Homer Mullins

[test]

genious...this is pretty good stuff...i dont mind listening to the voicemails, i mind accessing my vmail account....for some weird reason...and i always thought if you have a bb or a ppc smart phone, why cant the vmail automatically be dl'd to your phone as a sound file....or maybe you can just dl it to your pc.....but since that wont happen, this is a nice alt

[LAW]

Hello!

Do any of you have any advice on general paging services for BlackBerry? I have looked at a couple of services (pagica and numericpage), as well as investigated carrier-based options (pretty meager, it seems, except for Cingular's Enterprise Paging).

RIM also offers paging for a select few models but no Java-enabled models are supported, and we have 7520, 7290, 7100, and 7250 units.

What's your take on the direction we should go? A transcription service would likely be out of the question. We're looking for basic numeric and text paging.

[Mark Rejhon]

I think pagica and numericpage would work. Basically a gateway that forwards numeric pages to your BlackBerry. And Cingular's Enterprise as well. It seems like you already covered all the bases -- I guess you're shopping around for other options?

If you are trying to save money by avoiding pagica or other third party, use the 7520 model - because if you are on Nextel, did you know Nextel already provides free numeric paging with your BlackBerry. (For instructions, refer to Nextel, or search for 'nextel paging')

Some carriers provide a special phone number that allows you to send a numeric page to a BlackBerry (all models), and Nextel is one of them.

[scotsil27]

I read your post with interest. Why not use IP Relay for free? Have the calls fowarded to your MY IP Relay number and have them convert the message to text? Is it because you have to get in touch with an operator? If so, I understand why not. But then, how do you get calls on your blackberry from a voice caller? Im intersted in knowing if you can do VCO calls on a bberry wihtout having to use an additional pocket vco device because I am deaf. Thanks.

[morisr]

Hi, I am interested in buying a blackberry phone but I like to know first if I can send and receive voice messages. (voice memo). Voice messaging is just like text messaging except you record your voice message and send it to any phone or email with no extra charge.

if anyone is already doing that please let me know. thanks.

[motekfischtein]

Anyone know of any Canadian providers for the Voicemail to Text Messaging transcription service?

[wickhamz]

I am not deaf, so I am just curious if this is advantageous to a person who is capable of listening to messages. I hope this does not sound as though I feel the program is useless. I am just trying to see if it would be at all helpful to me.

[bertiebassett]

here in the UK, these guys get good press...

SpinVox - converting voicemail to mobile phone texts - free trial

but I don't really get a large enough volume of voicemails to make it worthwhile..

[jdposhkus]

I use a product called Simulscribe. It transcribes voice mail to text or email.. It works like a charm. It is slick and easy to use and set up. The support is awesome too. It works very fast too. People are bugged out when I show them their message.

[motekfischtein]

After signing up with Simulscribe (who are great by the way) and getting a new voice mail number I cancelled my Rogers voice mail and tried programming my 8700r so that all conditional calls are forwarded to my new Simulscribe number. (*004* the new vm number #)

My 8700r wont let me forward the calls to a US number but takes a Canadian number just fine.

I was able to do this with about 18 months ago without issue. Any solutions out there would be much appreciated. Thanks.

[crazylegs]

Bump

[Mark Rejhon]

Originally Posted by motekfischtein

After signing up with Simulscribe (who are great by the way) and getting a new voice mail number I cancelled my Rogers voice mail and tried programming my 8700r so that all conditional calls are forwarded to my new Simulscribe number. (*004* the new vm number #)

My 8700r wont let me forward the calls to a US number but takes a Canadian number just fine.

I was able to do this with about 18 months ago without issue. Any solutions out there would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Get an 800 phone number and forward it to your voicemail. You can get an 800 number at TollFreeForwarding.com

I do this for a different service that I can't access from Vonage Canada, because they still use U.S. 800 phone number routing, which means Canadian 800 numbers not accessible from the U.S., are still inaccessible. A workaround for now.

[Mark Rejhon]

Added newly popular voicemail-to-text service: SpinVox

[Mark Rejhon]

FAQ now updated with new vendors.

[jeffmik]

SimulSays - www.SimulSays.com is another one - haven't tried any before just had a friend send it to me.

[SchmutzBerry]

Originally Posted by Mark Rejhon

Get an 800 phone number and forward it to your voicemail. You can get an 800 number at TollFreeForwarding.com

I do this for a different service that I can't access from Vonage Canada, because they still use U.S. 800 phone number routing, which means Canadian 800 numbers not accessible from the U.S., are still inaccessible. A workaround for now.

any other solutions found yet from anyone? this is doable but seems cumbersome and the more links in a chain, the more likely something will go wrong sometimes and not work.
so if anyone has any other solutions?
what is it with Rogers? no unlimited data plan (at least they fixed their lies) - and now this.