What is Voicemail service and how to use with a telephone with an answering machine.

Voicemail vs Answering System (Machine)

Using a Panasonic telephone, you can receive two different types of voice messages:

Voicemail Messages

Voicemail Is a service offered by your telephone provider. Messages are stored in their system and accessed remotely. After you subscribe to this service, your phone service provider’s voice mail system answers calls for you when you are unavailable to answer the phone or when your line is busy. When you have a new voicemail:

“New Voice Mail”, “Voice mail msg. via phone co.” or a voicemail icon will be displayed on the handset.
Typically you will need to dial an access number given to you by your telephone service provider, followed by a security code or PIN number. Contact your telephone service provider for specific access instructions.
Your Panasonic telephone will allow you to store your access number and PIN for convenience.

Note: Because telephone service providers sometimes bundle services, you may not receive an indicator on your telephone when you have a Voicemail. In this case, you will need to contact your telephone service provider to see what services you have and how to access them.

Answering System (Machine) Messages

An answering machine message is stored on your telephone’s built-in recording device. When you have a new answering machine message:

New messages/play indicator will flash on the base.
“New message” will be displayed on the handset.
Press [ MENU # 3 2 3 ] on the handset or [ PLAY/STOP ] on the base to listen.

What should I use?

Use Voicemail instead of your answering machine

At any time you can turn off your answering machine and utilize only voicemail.

Use your Answering machine instead of Voicemail

Contact your telephone service provider to disable your voicemail service.

Use both your Answering machine and Voicemail

In this case, if you are on a call or the answering machine is already recording a message and you receive another call, the third caller is able to leave a voicemail message. If you are not on a call or the answering machine is not recording a message, the caller can leave a message on the answering machine

Contact your telephone service provider to learn how to program your voicemail settings.
Set your answering machine to answer calls at least 2 rings earlier than your voicemail (i.e. if your telephone provider tells you that voicemail is set to answer after 6 rings, set your answering machine to 4 rings). ome providers program voicemail based on a time delay in seconds rather than rings. In this case, use 6 seconds per ring as the standard when setting the answering machine ring count.
Your Panasonic telephone will allow you to store your access number and PIN for convenience.

Voicemail Operational Inquiries

Select a question, then press "Confirm".

How to Store a Voicemail Access Number.

After you subscribe to Voicemail service, your phone service provider’s voice mail system answers calls for you when you are unavailable to answer the phone or when your line is busy. Messages are recorded by your phone service provider, not your telephone. In order to listen to your voice mail messages, you must dial your phone service provider’s voice mail access number. Once you have stored your voice mail access number, you can dial it automatically..

Note

If you are storing your voice mail access number and your mailbox password, you need to add pauses between the two. To do this press [ ▲ ], this will insert a 3.5 sec pause between the access number and the password. If more time is required hit the arrow up again. As an example if you require a 10 second pause then you would press the arrow up button 3 times to insert a total of 10.5 seconds.

The following video is an example of the programming. Buttons and screens vary by model. Model shown is KX-TGB310

Press [ MENU # 3 3 1].
Enter your access number.
Press [ SAVE ].
Press [ OFF ].

How to turn off the Voicemail indicator.

Voicemail is an automatic answering service offered by your phone service provider. After you subscribe to this service, your phone service provider’s voice mail system answers calls for you when you are unavailable to answer the phone or when your line is busy. When a message is recorded a notification is displayed.

Normally this notification is automatically cleared after you listen to the message.

To listen to the message, dial the Voice Mail number provided by your service provider/telephone company (for most cases, this will be your own phone number), and follow the voice instructions. Refer to the FAQ "How to use a Voicemail service with a telephone company.

If you have listened to all your voice mail messages and the handset still shows the Voicemail indicator the indicator can be manually cleared.

There are several ways to clear the message.

Method 1, On the handset press and hold the [#] button until the handset beeps. (most common method)
Method 2, On the handset press and hold the [Clear] button until the handset beeps.
Method 3, On the handset press and hold the [OFF] button until the handset beeps.

Video example of process to manually clear the indicator. Process varies by model.

Model in video handset KX-TGFA30, included with several models including KX-TGF34x, KX-TGF35x series, KX-TG133, KX-TG153, KX-TG175.

Refer to your models Operating Manual for model specific procedure.

How to set the Voicemail ring count.

Voicemail is a service provided by a telephone line service provider.

The procedure to change the rings may vary from telephone line service provider.

Contact your telephone line service provider for their procedure in changing your voicemail ring count.

How to turn off Voicemail tone detection.

Your voicemail service provider sends special signals to the unit to let you know that you have new voicemail messages. If you hear a series of dial tones followed by a continuous dial tone after you press the call button, you have new voicemail messages. The unit can detect these signals automatically.

Turn this feature off in the following situations:

You do not subscribe to voicemail service.
Your phone is connected to a PBX.
The indicator is on and there are no messages.

Press [ MENU # 3 3 2 ].
Press the arrow up ▲ or down ▼ button to select the desired setting.
Press [ SAVE ].

I do not want the calls to go to Voicemail.

Make sure the answering machine is turned ON by pressing the [ANSWER ON] button till the indicator lights up on the base.
Adjust the ring count on the answering machine to less than the voice mail (service from your telephone company) ring count.
If you do not want to use the Voice mail service from your telephone company contact them to turn the service off.

The Answering machine answers before voicemail.

The answering system needs to be turned OFF.

Press the [ANSWER ON/OFF] button and make sure that the answering system has been turned OFF. If the indicator is lit, your answering system is still turned ON.