Except that with my unlocked Pixel and iPhones - neither of which were purchased from Verizon - those features work perfectly fine. So it's not necessarily because it wasn't purchased from Verizon. But these are the things I was worried about, which is why I appreciate HTC having a 30-day refund policy. There was much discussion about the U11 being "certified" by Verizon, but the discussions were very vague. People on internet boards insisting that "certification" meant everything would work, yada, yada, yada. Yet here were are, no service in non-LTE areas, no WiFi calling (which would have helped with the previous issue), no Visual Voicemail - and those are the shortcomings I've discovered after less than 24 hours with it. Proving once again that you can say pretty much anything on the internet whether it's true or not.
HOWEVER - this is a really beautiful and well-built phone. I'm going to hate having to return it if none of these issues are resolved in the next couple weeks.