What Features Google Voice Needs to Add

For the past few months, rumors have been circulating about the next version of Google’s universal phone/voicemail service, GrandCentral.

The so-called GrandCentral 2.0 is imminent, according to people ranging from the New York Times’ David Pogue (cited by Silicon Alley Insider) to Lifehacker’s Adam Posh. This in itself is interesting because Google has been ending a host of services to stop profits for falling.

What is not clear is what features the new GrandCentral version will include. So, here’s what I would like to see, after beta testing GrandCentral for more than a year now. (You may also be interested in a post called, “What’s Not Happening with Google GrandCentral” which I wrote last October.)

• SMS: One major drawback of GrandCentral is that you cannot send or receive text messages (SMS or short message service) with GC. The effect of this is that when I want to text a friend, I have to do it from my phone’s internal number. That’s often confusing for my friends, because they’re not always aware that I have two numbers. And, I am probably missing out on a bunch of text messages that people have thought they sent to me, because they sent them to my GrandCentral number. (I am blaming Google for the fact that I  have not had more dates… LOL).
• Caller ID: Along the same lines, when I call people, my internal phone number shows on recipients’ caller ID. I can’t tell you how many times I have had to explain why the number from which I am calling is not the number I want people to call. It gets old and people generally seem bewildered.
• iPhone compatibility: There IS an iPhone app for GrandCentral, but not one made by Google. The Grandialer app (iTunes link) is a bit cumbersome for my taste. For instance, when I make a call using the app, the phone calls me and then connects the call. It’s time consuming. It also means that my call log is not accurate, since I have a bunch of calls to myself. I do talk to myself occasionally, but not on the phone.
• Visual voicemail: Using GrandCentral means I cannot use one of the coolest features of the iPhone: visual voicemail. Because of the compatiblity issues, I am forced to choose between giving people my iPhone number and using GrandCentral.
• Message transcription: Competing telephony services, such as YouMail and PhoneTag already offer voicemail transcription services. Considering how well the Google search app does at voice recognition already, this seems like it ought to be a no brainer for Google.
• GMail Contacts synchronization: When someone calls me, shouldn’t their phone number be added to my GMail contacts list? If I change a number, name, etc. shouldn’t that update as well? Seems like that would be a sought-after feature!

This is my wish list. What new features do you want to see in GrandCentral 2.0?

Take this survey and maybe we can help make GrandCentral even better.