Phone Etiquette

Person-A calls Person-B and leaves a voicemail on his/her cell phone.

Scenarios:

1. Person-A hangs up and does not leave a voicemail.
2. Person-A did not specify the purpose of the call.
3. Person-A is just saying hello.
4. Person-A wants to share some news.
5. Person-A has a question and needs an answer.

Relationship between Person-A and Person-B:
a) No relationship (i.e. telemarketer)
b) Co-workers
c) Acquaintances
d) Friends
e) Family or significant other

Some of these scenarios for certain relationship are clear, but some are not so black and white. There are 25 different combinations. What is the phone etiquette nowadays?

Here are some specific questions:

• Does a phone call mean a phone call in return?
• Is it rude to respond with a text message or email instead of a phone call?
• What do you do when Person-B doesn't return the phone call(s) in a timely manner or even worse not at all? What if Person-B is supposedly a friend?
• Is it rude to answer a phone call when you are with company? In that case, do you shut off the phone?

I usually return every phone call for friends and family, but no so much for my guy "friends" (note the quotes), especially if I feel uncomfortable about it. In general, I get annoyed when someone does not return my call in some kind of format (a return call, text message, email or something).

Here's a real example: Friend-1 stopped calling Friend-2 b/c of this situation about phone etiquette. The sad thing is that all the friends are not happy with Friend-2's phone etiquette. I don't know how to approach her, but she'll probably be reading this blog post.

[Tags: phone, etiquette]