Patent ID: 7978830

Claim:
A method comprising: storing, via a voicemail system, a plurality of messages, each of the plurality of messages being received from one of a plurality of parties and being associated with a subscriber of the voicemail system; providing, via the voicemail system and to the subscriber, information about one of the plurality of stored messages; receiving, via the voicemail system, a reply message, from the subscriber, in response to the one of the plurality of stored messages and the information; receiving, via the voicemail system, an input from the subscriber, the input representing two or more of the plurality of parties; sending, via the voicemail system and as a broadcast message, the reply message to the two or more of the plurality of parties, where sending the reply message includes: identifying, based on information associated with the stored plurality of messages, a first format associated with one of the plurality of parties and a second format associated with another of the plurality of parties, where the first and second formats differ, sending the reply message to the one of the plurality of parties in the first format, and sending the reply message to another of the plurality of parties in the second format; determining, via the voicemail system, that the one of the plurality of parties did not confirm, within a particular time period, receipt of the reply message in the first format; and automatically resending, via the voicemail system, the reply message to the one of the plurality of parties in a third format, that differs from the first format, in response to determining that the one of the plurality of parties did not confirm, within the particular time period, receipt of the reply message in the first format.