Galaxy S4 (Verizon branded) on Straight Talk - Visual Voicemail suddenly not working

[cgdiddy]

I'm using my old Verizon branded Galaxy S4 with Straight Talk (because ST told me that my S6 was incompatible with their service), and have been for about a week now. I haven't had any issues until today. I woke up and found that at least two strange things occurred with my phone while I was asleep:

1) I had text messages from several different text alert services telling me that I had successfully "unsubscribed" from their services. I have not done anything of the kind.

2) My visual voicemail was gone. It had been working just fine with straight talk, until now. Now I get a screen telling me that I have to pay $2.99/month for visual voicemail, or I have to call in to listen to messages (a la 1995). The $2.99/month for visual voicemail is a Verizon thing. ST has confirmed with me that they wouldn't be asking me to pay them for visual voicemail. I'm guessing that this has happened due to using a Verizon branded phone.



I spoke to a "technical help rep" via their online chat for probably an entire hour. The guy had no clue what visual voicemail even was, and helped with nothing. After wasting an hour chatting with him, he said I should call the ST technical help phone number. Yes, the technical help guy advised me to call technical help... after having no clue how to help himself.

Can anybody shed light on this problem? Can I dump all the verizon branding and such from this phone somehow, and, what do I need to do to get visual voicemail back to working on my phone?

Thanks ahead of time for any answers.

 

[Rukbat]

I'm guessing that this has happened due to using a Verizon branded phone.

No, it's happening because you're using Verizon as your carrier (ST is just your network operator - you're using Verizon towers).

I spoke to a "technical help rep" via their online chat for probably an entire hour. The guy had no clue what visual voicemail even was

Typical of ST. Try their Facebook page for technical help.

Can anybody shed light on this problem? Can I dump all the verizon branding and such from this phone somehow, and, what do I need to do to get visual voicemail back to working on my phone?

The branding doesn't make any difference. Verizon is charging ST for VVM, so they're charging you. If you use a GSM phone, you can get an AT&T or TMobile ST SIM (whichever carrier covers your area better), and you won't be dealing with Verizon. (But you'll be dealing with anything that AT&T or TMobile does.)

There are only 4 major carriers in the US - AT&T, Sprint, TMobile and Verizon. The MVNOs (like Straight Talk, Virgin and the others) use one of those carriers, and are subject to the rules of the carrier your phone uses.

 

[cgdiddy]

Thanks for the reply, Rukbat.

I tried calling ST, they didn't do any better than the online chat tech rep. I did verify that, as you said, since my phone originally came from Verizon, it is going to use Verizon towers with ST.

It still doesn't make sense to me that Verizon is throwing their $2.99/month voicemail ad at me under ST, as I haven't found anybody else who uses ST with a Verizon phone to have that issue. Just to test it out, I clicked "subscribe" on the $2.99/voicemail page, and it didn't do anything.

I even tried installing YOUMAIL, to use them for visual voicemail instead. When it tries to install, the installation code tries to connect as a phone number, and is met with a Verizon recording saying "The call cannot be completed as dialed."

I have no clue what the hell happened to my phone. Everything worked just fine yesterday. I woke up today, and this was all f'd up.

 

[Shreyas Poovani]

i am on Verizon unlocked Galaxy S5 with Straight talk, realized the problem. Just registered for google voice mail. Works well so far. You'll also get an email with the voice file. So you can't miss VM anymore. I just had to send a activation code from my phone dialer that enabled conditional call forwarding.

https://www.google.com/voice