SMS services company Esendex has announced the launch of Voice SMS, which enables customers to send SMS messages in voice format directly to mobile phones and fixed lines world-wide. The company says that Voice SMS is simple, effective and ideally suited for mission critical situations, where proof of delivery is needed, or for those who cant easily read an SMS, such as drivers, the elderly and visually impaired.
Voice SMS converts text messages, sent using Esendexs system, into a voice call that is forwarded to the recipients phone. The Esendex Voice SMS service will make repeated attempts to deliver the message and will prompt the recipient to acknowledge that the message has been received, providing an important audit trail.
Messages are sent via Esendexs highly resilient network which, combined with the services acknowledge and audit functionality, represents a flexible and reliable business communications tool. Likely applications for Voice SMS include messaging  mobile workers, particularly out of hours or in emergency situations, as well as contacting visually impaired customers or those with reading difficulties.
Voice SMS represents a key development in the use of text messaging as a business critical communications tool, says Esendex Managing Director, Adam Bird. In both a commercial environment and in the public sector, being able to prove a message has been received and understood is increasingly important. Voice SMS builds on our expertise transporting text messages via both a simple web interface and our APIs to provide yet another avenue for communications with employees, customers or partners.”
Voice SMS is available to all new and existing business messaging customers as a no-cost option. Pricing starts at 20 per month for 200 SMS or Voice SMS messages, regardless of destination country.