Hi,

I bought a Samsung Gallaxy A11 Tracfone to replace my old Tracfone (3G).
Note: Most of the time, the phone is turned OFF. I also have a landline
phone.

I called Tracfone tech support in order to have the air time and minutes
from old phone transferred to the new one after it was activated.

In setting up the new phone, the tech guy told me I MUST set up
VoiceMail before I can make telephone calls. Note: I did NOT want VoiceMail,
but I was persuaded to set up Voice Mail. I found out later I did NOT need
VoiceMail to make phone calls.

There is no way I know to undo the VoiceMail. I changed my VoiceMail
message to "Do not leave a message or telephone number. I have disabled
the VoiceMail app on this phone".

This should work for live callers, but not robo callers.

After several months go by, I may enable VoiceMail app temporally to
see how many messages I have.

Can I DELETE the messages without hearing them?

Thank You in advance, John

jaugustine@verizon.net wrote:

> There is no way I know to undo the VoiceMail.

I know plenty of people who just call themselves a few times and leave a
five second message each time until their alotted voicemail queue fills up
(although they also need to set the automatic deletion time to "never").

jaugustine@verizon.net wrote:

> I bought a Samsung Gallaxy A11 Tracfone to replace my old Tracfone (3G).
> Note: Most of the time, the phone is turned OFF. I also have a landline
> phone.
>
> I called Tracfone tech support in order to have the air time and minutes
> from old phone transferred to the new one after it was activated.
>
> In setting up the new phone, the tech guy told me I MUST set up
> VoiceMail before I can make telephone calls. Note: I did NOT want VoiceMail,
> but I was persuaded to set up Voice Mail. I found out later I did NOT need
> VoiceMail to make phone calls.
>
> There is no way I know to undo the VoiceMail. I changed my VoiceMail
> message to "Do not leave a message or telephone number. I have disabled
> the VoiceMail app on this phone".
>
> This should work for live callers, but not robo callers.
>
> After several months go by, I may enable VoiceMail app temporally to
> see how many messages I have.
>
> Can I DELETE the messages without hearing them?

Here we go again a third time.

Tracfone is an MVNO. They resell services from real carriers. Looks
like your Tracfone account is linked to Verizon services. However, you
have a Tracfone account, not a Verizon account, so you cannot log into a
Verizon account to disable voicemail. I've run into that before where
Tracfone said the carrier had to disable voicemail, but the carrier saw
I was not their customer, so they wouldn't support me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_virtual_network_operator

You get cheaper costs through an MVNO, but you don't get all the
features or control over whomever they assign to you a carrier. Because
you cannot log into a Verizon account, you cannot use a web UI to select
multiple messages to delete all at once. You're stuck with whatever
voice prompts the carrier provides for managing your messages via phone
call to them. Typically all you get is you can delete a single message
AFTER having to [start to] listen to the message. That is, you get to
delete then one at a time. Whatever options are available when you call
your own number from your phone number, or call in from a different
phone number but give the PIN to get into your account, with their voice
prompt system is all you can use.

Although Verizon acquired Tracfone, Tracfone still operates as an MVNO.
Currently Tracfone has me assigned to AT&T for cellular service.
Tracfone says nothing will immediately change, doesn't know what will
happen in the future, but something will likely change in the future as
Tracfone restructures to become a Verizon subsidiary. As long as
Tracfone operates as an MVNO, you don't get a Verizon account into which
you can login to manage a Verizon account. You just get what you can do
by calling your voicemail, and going through the voice prompts.

https://www.verizon.com/about/news/verizon-completes-tracfone-wireless-inc-acquisition
https://support.tracfone.com/expresshelp/verizon-acquisition

When I wanted to disable the voicemail service with AT&T, Tracfone
couldn't help. They weren't the service provider. When I contacted
AT&T to disable the voicemail service, they said to log into my AT&T
account. I'm not a customer of AT&T, so I couldn't login. When I
called AT&T again, they said I was a Tracfone customer, not an AT&T
customer, and wouldn't help me. Tracfone said they could alter services
at the assigned carrier. Once voicemail was enabled at the assigned
carrier when setting up my Tracfone account, I could not get it
disabled. Tracfone's only suggestion was to close my current account,
and create a new account under which I would NEVER grant enabling the
voicemail service.

Could be Verizon refuses to not setup voicemail when creating a new
account since that gives them an assured communications venue to contact
you (whether you listen to messages or not). Seems the best choice is
to never use an MVNO, and be a direct customer of the cellular provider,
but that means paying more for more control.

You already asked about this back on March 7, 2022 which was a duplicate
of your same inquiry back on February 26, 2022. What did you think
changed in the meantime? Are you going to keep reposting your same
inquiry at 1 to 3 month intervals?

Am 16.05.22 um 08:24 schrieb VanguardLH:
> jaugustine@verizon.net wrote:
>> After several months go by, I may enable VoiceMail app temporally to
>> see how many messages I have.
>>
>> Can I DELETE the messages without hearing them?
>
> Here we go again a third time.
>
> Tracfone is an MVNO. They resell services from real carriers. Looks

Same procedure as every month.

--
Audiatur et altera pars

<jaugustine@verizon.net> wrote

|
| I bought a Samsung Gallaxy A11 Tracfone to replace my old Tracfone
(3G).
| Note: Most of the time, the phone is turned OFF. I also have a landline
| phone.
|

I have a nearly identical arrangement. It's always nice
to run into normal people. :)

The only difference is that I go for barebones. My Blu
phone cost $30. I recently got a TCL for $40. Both from
BestBuy. Official TracFone phones... Plus $20 every 3 months
for service.

I've also wondered before how to
delete without listening, but I find the messages seem to
time out. If I ignore them they disappear. I almost never
have reason to read texts or check messages, since I
don't give the number to anyone. (I don't even know
it myself, offhand.) I set up voicemail only as a "just in case"
option. I wasn't required to do it, but I did notice an irritating
restriction: I could no longer have voicemail without
recording a message.

For cellphone addicts who think they finally have my
"inside line" I explain that while I'm calling on a cellphone,
they shouldn't call back or text because it may be a month
before I turn the phone on again. So there's generally no
reason for me to check messages.

I've been finding, increasingly, that I also have to explain
my landline. People on cellphones seem to no longer get
warnings that they're trying to text a landline. Then they get
angry: "Why did you ring the doorbell? I texted you and told
you to call me when you arrive on my front porch!"

I have to walk them through it: "You texted a landline, which
is a real telephone connected to a wire. It's not a screen for
receiving inane text messages. It's not an app for calling
DoorDash. It just does phone calls... Now, do you need me
to explain how your doorbell works?"

Am 16.05.22 um 13:52 schrieb Mayayana:
> <jaugustine@verizon.net> wrote
>
> |
> | I bought a Samsung Gallaxy A11 Tracfone to replace my old Tracfone
> (3G).
> | Note: Most of the time, the phone is turned OFF. I also have a landline
> | phone.
> |
>
> I have a nearly identical arrangement. It's always nice
> to run into normal people. :)

Why do you think this is normal?

It is very old-style because usually callers want talk to a specific
person and not a location. That is only guaranteed by calling a cell phone.

--
De gustibus non est disputandum

<SNIP>
> I've also wondered before how to
>delete without listening, but I find the messages seem to
>time out. If I ignore them they disappear. I almost never
>have reason to read texts or check messages, since I
>don't give the number to anyone. (I don't even know
>it myself, offhand.) I set up voicemail only as a "just in case"
>option. I wasn't required to do it, but I did notice an irritating
>restriction: I could no longer have voicemail without
>recording a message.

Hi Mayayana,

Your response is what I was hoping for, "If I ignore them
they disappear".

Thank You Very Much, John