YouMail has announced its unveiled its simplest solution yet to block unwanted phone calls from telemarketers, robots, and the like. The two apps from YouMail in the Google Play Store, Visual Voicemail Plus and WhoAreYou, now incorporate the ability to “ditch” a phone number entirely with a single tap.
WhoAreYou and Visual Voicemail work together to combat these unwanted calls. If you use WhoAreYou, a incoming call will appear on your Android handset with a popup including the option to ditch the phone number. If you choose to do so, YouMail’s Visual Voicemail Plus service will recognize the phone number has been blocked and totally disregard it.
Once a phone number is ditched, you can’t see or hear any calls from it. The caller can’t leave voicemail messages or even try to reach you, as they will be told over the phone that your number is out of service and will hear the familiar tone telemarketers often use as a signal to take the number off their records.
One thing I will tip my hat to Android for is its ability to incorporate services like these to block specific calls. On most other phones including the iPhone, it’s impossible to manage a black list directly on the device. In some cases, you can go to your carrier and have them do it for you, but it’s still way more of a hassle than it should be.
YouMail’s Visual Voicemail Plus and WhoAreYou apps are available for free in the Google Play Store. If you’re a Google Voice user and you don’t want Google+ being shoved in your face (let’s be honest, you probably don’t use it), you might want to give YouMail’s services a whirl.