How does YouMail work?
The way mobile voicemail works is that if you don't answer your call within a certain number of rings, the call is forwarded to an access number. So:
- When you get a cell phone from a wireless carrier like AT&T, T-Mobile, or Verizon, the access number is the one for your carrier's voicemail.
- And when you press "1" or the voicemail key, it dials that access number to retrieve your messages.
The way YouMail works is simple:
- We have a different access number, which is answered by our voicemail system.
- We give you the "code" to enter on your phone that forwards your unanswered calls to our access number.
That means a couple of things: YouMail doesn't know anything about your old greeting or your old voicemail. So you need to record a greeting for YouMail if you want people to hear your voice. And if for some reason, you need an old voicemail on your carrier, you need to call their access number to retrieve it.
On the bright side, you get a ton of great features: visual voicemail applications for the iPhone and Blackberry phone, access to your voicemail on your PC, and much, much more.