There's no doubt that voice mail transcription has improved the strained relationship we all have with voice mail. My guess is the cool factor for voice mail wore off about 2 days after it was invented.

Since it's easier to scan text than to call in and listen, the appeal of voice mail transcription is pretty obvious. One thing people may overlook though, is how much enjoyment you can get reading messages that the transcription program wasn't able to process well.

In fact, just for fun, here's what that first paragraph looks like when transcribed from voicemail:

'There's no doubt that voicemail transcription has improved this trained relationship we all have with voicemail my guess is the Cool factor for voicemail more off about 2 days after was invented since it's easier to scan texted to call in and listen the appeal a voicemail transcription seems is pretty obvious 1 thing people may over looked just how much enjoyed that you can get the messages at the transcription program wasn't able to process well.'

I'm impressed with the accuracy given my mumbling but this is still pretty entertaining when read in a Yakov Smirnoff accent.

Every week I get dozens of transcribed voice mails and I can always count on a few good laughs. Sometimes the transcribed text is totally useless (especially with certain, ahem, free voice mail transcription services I've used).

With accents, low talkers, fast talkers, and background noise, it's unavoidable even for the best services. That's why it's great that Grasshopper provides the option to have the voice mail transcribed again (at no additional cost), this time with human help so that you can make sense of it. Most of the time, transcriptions work great, but it's good to have the option to smooth out any wrinkles when it really counts.

And here's one of those junk voice mails from an autodialer, converted by another service I was testing out:

'Hi this is Cathy(?) at Assudan(?). You need to call Assudan(?) ___ to consolidate your credit cards down to as low as a 1.5% interest rates. This is not a new loan. This have been already approved by a certified non profit agency so if you can please have your statements ready ___ remember it's 18007966200. Again my name is Cathy and you can reach me at 18007966200 until 10:00 tonight. Thanks and have a great day.'

Glad I didn't waste time calling in to listen to that message.

Which brings me to another point (yes there are a few points in here somewhere). Many of the paid transcription services charge per message. To me, this is the wrong way to do it. If you're like me, you'll only end up resenting the fact that someone just wasted your hard earned money when they leave a pointless voice mail.

At Grasshopper, we want you to get value from voice mail transcription, without worrying about incremental costs. That's why we went with simple flat rate pricing. If you're anything like me, you won't even think about the relatively small cost of this feature. You'll only sit back, enjoy a laugh at the occasional mess up and wonder how anyone could get by without voicemail transcription.

Do you have any really bad voice mail transcriptions you can share?

Post them in the comments section (with names and other juicy/sensitive details blanked out) so that the rest of us can enjoy them too. And if anyone's looking into credit card consolidation, call 'Cathy(?)' at 'Assudan(?) ___' before 10:00 tonight.