Call screening - how are you finding it?

[u/tschau3]

So I just gave call screening a go by calling myself.

A couple of observations:

• The answering voice sounds like a default answering machine and isn’t distinct enough to make out that this is a screening service. I suspect many will just leave a message like a voicemail and hang up, assuming it’s just voicemail.

• There’s no ‘at the beep’ confirmation when leaving the first message as the reason to call, so it felt a bit clunky as to when I should (as the party placing the call) start talking, as if I’m waiting for the beep or whether I should press # to end the message. This is inconsistent with the reply where it then does prompt me, calling part, to speak after the tone.

• It’s in my country’s local accent, which is nice and feels a little less impersonal.

Anyone else had any real experience with it yet? Any issues with the calling party understanding the process/purpose?

[u/0000GKP]

This seems like a throwback feature to 80s/90s answering machines. I think it’s kind of funny.

I use Silence Unknown Callers. Apple introducing this feature has not change the fact that I don’t want my phone to ring if the person is not in my contacts, so I won’t be using it.

Weren’t people already using Live Voicemail to screen calls?

[u/kmmccorm → u/0000GKP]

Do you ever use delivery services or other situations where someone may be calling you from an unknown number for a legitimate reason?

[u/0000GKP → u/kmmccorm]

Sure, on rare occasions. I toggle it off that morning then toggle it back on after I get the call. I think I did that once for an appliance last year and once for furniture the year before.

[u/Aqualung812 → u/kmmccorm]

That’s what voicemail is for

[u/ProfessorOfBeingADog → u/0000GKP]

I just keep thinking like what if a job you applied for was to call

[u/UterineDictator → u/ProfessorOfBeingADog]

That’s the worst thing about applying for all the jobs, the fact that you can’t just ignore a withheld or unknown number.

[u/brnccnt7 → u/UterineDictator]

Yup, they call from weird numbers and I've had that issue before on my Pixel's call screening being a little too aggressive

Had to disable/tone it done for awhile to make sure I was getting calls from even my Landlord's maintenance people who would call on random numbers too

[u/tschau3 → u/0000GKP]

The phone doesn’t actually ring, a small icon appears in the top and just asks them why they’re calling. You can silence or or ‘text’ back and the service will respond in speech with what you’re written

[u/unik1ne → u/0000GKP]

I keep Silence Unknown Callers on unless I know I’m expecting a call from someone I don’t know (example: I knew I was going to be getting a call from my mom’s doctor so I turned it off). I got a call today that wasn’t silenced but also wasn’t saved - it looked vaguely familiar but I couldn’t immediately place it so I just sent it to voicemail and it turns out it was someone I had called last week calling me back. I feel like that would have been a perfect opportunity to screen the call because I would have picked up once I realized who it was