Your and my voicemail should hookup!
I change my work voice mail only when I’m on vacation.
Our home voice mail is just a crappy “Leave a message and we’ll call you back.” When we first got married, we recorded an awesomely funny message with background music that was so great that people were hanging up and calling us back just to hear it again. One time I was having something repaired and when they called to tell me it was done the guy had everybody he worked with call our number just to hear our message. (He told me so.) Then the machine died. 
I am so stealing that! You know, the next time I get around to changing my voicemail message.
My work one almost never gets changed, unless I’m going on vacation (and thankfully, we can have multiple greetings so I never have to re-record my default).
I use Youmail, so my cell gets changed randomly upon my mood since I can do it on the computer. It’s almost never my voice - right now it’s Eric Idle singing some goofy MP song. I also have custom greetings for certain people so they always here the same thing: My father gets The OSU fight song, my best friend gets the theme to The Godfather.
I change it on very rare occasions. Last time I changed it was because an unpleasant person was trying to make my life miserable, so I wanted to be sure to sound extra cheerful on my voicemail, to get her goat.
I have VM by default. I’m not in a situation where I’d ever rather have a VM than a text. I grudgingly check it on the rare occasion that someone leaves a message just to clear the insistent red dot off my phone icon. Also, listening to “You have… 1… new message, received on… August… 20… 1st, at… 5… 30… 8… PM” isn’t any less annoying in Japanese.
“You have reached 555-5555. Please leave a message at the tone.”
No reason to change that. Ever.
It’s interesting that this thread came about, as I was recently debating whether or not to update mine. It’s been about 2 years since I’ve gone through that surprisingly stressful process.
I don’t remember when I changed it. I know I did it just so it wasn’t the default, because I hate the default. When I get that on other people’s phones, I often don’t know I’ve reached the right person because cell numbers change hands so often, so I hate it. I just made a message with my voice and name, so people know they got my VM, but heck if I can remember what it says. I guess I should check.
Mine’s pretty much the same as yours, chizzuk “Hi, you’ve reached [full name]. I’m sorry I’m unable to take your call at the moment, but please leave your name, number and a brief message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible”
I use my mobile phone for job searching when I’m in the mood, so I prefer to keep something as bland and identifiable as possible.
I hate twee voicemail recordings with “funny” lists of why you haven’t answered the phone, or whatever. Just give me your name and if necessary instructions on how to work your VM system, and I’ll do what I have to do.
Which is exactly why I start my message with telling you that # will take you to the beep. So you don’t have to listen to my twee message if you don’t want to. ![]()
I don’t bother including the number. If they can’t dial correctly, it’s on them.![]()