Setting up voice mail

[brodieonline]

I can empathize with people being overwhelmed.  I looked through the community for a while, and ran into a post that said I can setup voice mail by using another phone, calling my cell phone, declining the answer, and pressing * to go to voice mail management.  I didn't know my password, but I could reset that online and then it defaulted to my phone number.  Easy enough.  I called back and tried repeatedly to set a voice mail, and it was working... I just couldn't decide what to say, so I kept deleting and retrying.  And then I pressed the wrong button and got into some other menu and it didn't give me an option to get out of it.  So I hung up.

I repeated the above steps - using another phone, calling my cell phone, declining the answer, and pressing * to go to voice mail management.  However, this time, it told me that I can only setup voice mail from my phone - which I assume means my cell phone.

Did I do something wrong that made it so I can no longer set it up?  Based on my frequent retries with the message, I don't want to burn through my minutes using my cell phone to set it up if I can avoid it.

[brodieonline]

@Anonymous , I didn't intentionally reset my password again, no.  But, as I recall, when I entered my (new) password, it said "That's wrong", and I did it again, and it said "That's wrong", and I did it again and it moved forward.  I'm a bit confused as to what happened exactly there.  Resetting it again isn't a bad idea if I have any additional issues.  But at the end of the day, my voice mail was setup acceptably, and that was sufficient for me that day 🙂

[Anonymous]

 @brodieonline 

During that session on the other phone, did you set your password?

After muddling up something, I would have done the password reset on the self-serve again. I don't think it's a one-off thing.

[brodieonline]

Yeah, I had noticed that suggestion @JoyLuck , and that's what I had been trying.  It worked the first time, but not the second time - it balked immediately saying it had to be done directly from the phone.  I *think* that this means the first one-time setup has to be done from the cell phone, and voice mail messages can be changed *afterwards* using that method.

[JoyLuck]

@brodieonline 

Something to consider if interested in saving minutes on the $15 plan.

From a post by @gblackma and idea from @Jb456 :

Add the TextNow voip app and use it via Wifi to make / receive / send calls and texts in Canada and to the United States for free. You can also use it as I do to check my voicemail from my own phone without using the minutes from the PM plan. Simply dial your PM phone number - reject the call when it rings (this sends the call to voicemail) - press the * key to allow you to enter your password. - enter - and you are in your voicemail account - Hang up when you are finished. No minutes used.

[brodieonline]

And yes, that did work, i.e. https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Knowledge-Base/How-To-Use-Your-Phone-and-Plan-Feature... as the basis to set it up.  I'm surprised that it allowed me to try to setup the voicemail message at all during my first attempt if there is other setup that is required (e.g. setting up the voicemail password and conventions related to it) that must absolutely be done from the cell phone.  I'm also not sure what the trigger was that caused it to balk the second time I called to set it up, when it had allowed it the first time.  I guess the system wasn't supposed to allow me to try the first time, that I somehow exploited a bug that didn't prevent me from attempting that workflow before the first time I'd tried from the phone itself.

Thanks!

[brodieonline]

Thanks, @Triguy , that link is very helpful.  I was uncertain how to start setting it up from the cell phone itself!

[brodieonline]

@computergeek541 , the security measure idea is certainly possible... but it was letting me set it up before I pressed the wrong button and then hung up to start over.  Maybe it is what it is now.  I suppose I could try really quickly setting a dummy message now that I have more practice, using my cell phone, and then try to change it with another phone afterwards, to minimize the amount of time used.

[Triguy · Accepted solution]

Setting up voicemail will use your minutes.

Here is more info.

https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Knowledge-Base/How-To-Use-Your-Phone-and-Plan-Feature...

[brodieonline]

@computergeek541 , I am on the $15 plan.  Trying to add cell service as cheaply as possible.

[computergeek541]

Unless you're on a $15 plan,I would not worry about calling in using a different phone.  If you call from your cell phone, no password would have been asked for, and it will actually ask you to set one.  I can only imagine that the setups not working unless you call from your cell phone could be a security measure.