Activation of Visual Voicemail

[5hole03]

I have a Pixel 9 Pro. I recently joined Visible, porting over my number from Verizon, all went perfect.

Recently my wife tried to call me and I did not answer. She tried to leave a message but the phone told her my voicemail was not set up.

I followed the directions and set up my voicemail. I can receive my voice mails by holding down the number 1 key and typing in my password. I DO NOT receive anything in my voicemail tab though, on my Pixel phone.

When I was with Verizon, I always would receive a notice in the voicemail tab on my pixel phone and could listen to the voicemail via that tab without having to dial my password.

Under settings/voicemail I have attempted to set up visual voicemail. For a day and a half, it has said “Activating Voicemail” Below is the “Change Pin” option. It is greyed out stating, “Visual Voicemail is not activated yet, please try again later.”

Spent over two hours on the messaging app with Visible dealing with a live agent. She was very helpful, but her numerous suggestions did not solve the problem. I have now been “Escalated” to the next level of support and should be contacted soon by phone or email. We shall see! Actually 2nd tier support did call me back. She told me they had done all they could do. Her advice was to re-set my phone or call Google. Really!!!!

I have deleted the data & cache from the Pixel phone app, I have re-set the network connection, toggled airplane mode on & off, I have tried visual voicemail while Wi-Fi is off and mobile data is on and vice-versa, I have rebooted numerous times, she has re-provisioned my voice mail from her end, and nothing seems to work. In the actual phone app, under settings/voicemail, it still says “activating voicemail.”

So as of now, I will never know if I have a voicemail message, as I receive no notice in the Pixel voicemail tab. The only way will be to check by dialing the #1 on the phone keypad after each missed call. I DO receive notice of a missed call.

Any suggestions or help would be greatly appreciated!!  

[DeanKevin64]

Something has happened with Google phone app and visual voicemail for me no longer works. My notifications stopped working also but that I may have fixed. If it is showing "activating voicemail" along with the greyed out PIN notice try this, if you have the change PIN option in the list below "activating voicemail" click on it, or call your viocemail, and change your PIN. You should get a text from Visible that you changed your PIN, it should activate voicemail, it did for me yesterday. You can then change your PIN back.

Just a little extra info. I just picked up a Pixel 9A a month ago. I set up voicemail on the new phone and it worked the first week I had the phone. About 2 weeks ago my voicemail and visual voicemail stopped working. Same issue as you, I got a voicemail and didn't know a message was left until hours later. I went into settings and noticed VVM was off, it was greyed out and couldn't turn it on. Forced a stop, cleared cache and storage and was able to turn it on but it hasn't worked since, until today. Good thing is I got a notification that a voicemail was left(also a little 1 on the voicemail tab), bad thing is VVM isn't working. Since I upgraded to Android 16 the day I got the phone it can't be that, what I think it is, is 2 weeks ago was about the time it update to the July update and think that is what caused this bug. I did the same as you, contacted Visible and they went through the same thing and nothing. I don't think this is just Visible though since I am on Reddit, both GooglePixel and Visible subreddits, someone mentioned it happened to them on T-Mobile, another mentioned they had the same issue on Motorola. 

I did send feedback to Google from the phone but not sure that does any good. Hopefully Google fixes this issue. 

[5hole03]

 DeanKevin64 thanks for the response, appreciate the help. Just for clarification, you are force stopping the phone app and clearing data & cache from the phone app, in setting, apps. If so I have done that several time. What I have not done is change my pin as you suggest. I'll have to do it though, by calling my voice mail. If I go to voicemail in the phone setting it has been stuck for days saying, "Activating Voicemail" and the change pin is greyed out. Thank you again for the suggestion.

Preview

[DeanKevin64]

Yes, clearing data and cache of phone app. Worth to try again before changing PIN. My change PIN option is below the greyed out part that says that it isn't activated yet. The option to change PIN may have not been on there last week but it did show up after I called VM and changed it. I don't know why changing the PIN activates it but it does, I also changed mine back or I would forget it. Again, the one thing it didn't do was put a VM on the list in the tab though. Hopefully you can at least get it activated and get notifications again. If I come up with a way to get VVM to sync I try and remember to post it.

[5hole03]

Did everything you suggested, nothing worked!! No worries, I wait for the next Pixel update and see if that fixes it. For now if I have a missed call I'll just check my voicemail. Again, thankyou for the suggestions.

[DeanKevin64]

Mine stopped working again today. Since Visible says everything is good on their end when I contacted them last week it has to be the phone app or the last update. I even tried to uninstall the last update on the phone app but that doesn't seem to help. Hopefully the next update fixes it. 

[DeanKevin64]

Here is another update. Since mine had stopped working this morning and no notification. I then went through the same thing again, I did have a tough time getting voicemail to activate by calling and changing my PIN as it didn't seem to want to activate. After about the third or fourth try on calling VM and changing PIN it finally activated. I did receive a call just now knowing a VM message would be left(power companies automated message about a schedule upcoming outage) I let it go to VM, not only did I get a notification but it showed up on my VVM list and could play it from there without the need to call.

One thing to try is to turn off VVM before doing the forced stop/clear cache and storage. Then go back and set it up again. I ended up having to call in to VM and changing my PIN 3 or 4 times to get VVM to activate but once you do the option to change PIN shows up on the page and you can change it without call VM. A phone restart might be needed but I didn't have to do that. I did restart mine this morning before going through the steps trying to get it to work again but didn't do one afterwards.

If you try this again I hope you can get it to work like I did. I just have my fingers crossed that when I wake up tomorrow that I don't have to do this all over again.

[5hole03]

Again, thank you so much for all the possible solutions. I'll keep trying!!

[5hole03]

OK, so I followed your suggestion verbatim. I turned off VVM. Went into the phone app, forced stopped, then deleted data/cache. Turned VVM back on, nothing. Next I changed my VM password 5 different times, still nothing. I rebooted my phone several times, still nothing. As of now I quit!! I'll wait & see if the August Pixel update changes anything. Thanks for all the help. 

[DeanKevin64]

You're welcome and sorry it didn't work for you. Hopefully an update fixes it.

I have searched on Reddit and it seems like this issue is a huge problem with all different models of Pixels. It has been reported a lot on there about these visual voicemail issue issue. It just baffles me that mine worked the first week and then stopped. I did send feedback to Google from the phone, not sure if it will help but maybe the more that complain about it the better chance it gets fixed. To do so it is in settings, about phone and send feedback is at the bottom.

[delliott]

This appears to have finally enabled VVM on my Samsung Galaxy...  Go into the android apps settings, locate the native - built in voicemail app (the Samsung app you cannot delete) and tick "disable".  After doing this, I was able to set up YouMail VVM app by following their prompts. Simple, fully working as expected, no other hoops to jump through. Presumably, the native app interferes with competing VM apps setup. Keep in mind that ongoing Samsung updates may necessitate again "disabling" the native vm app to keep VVM working. At this point, it's only a suggestion you may want to try.

[DeanKevin64]

On a Pixel you can toggle off VVM but VM is part of Google phone unlike Samsung that requires a separate VM app. I never had an issue on the S24 I had. Since that phone quit I got a Pixel and it seems to be an issue with them. If one wants to mess with another phone number and a 3rd party app there is also Google Voice also that you can forward phone calls to a number they give you. 

In the last month I have gotten it to work twice, last time was last week it worked and this past Monday it stopped again. I don't get many calls and of those I rarely get VM, I will just stick to calling VM if I don't answer a call. At some point either Google will fix the phone app or Visible will get the VM system working like it is supposed to.

[stevek]

YouMAIL VVM works great.  Visible reps should be telling other folks about using this instead of their own.  Eliminates the frustration of trying to resolve native issues.

[DeanKevin64]

Just curious if you got your voicemail/visual voicemail working? In the last 2 weeks I got it to work one day and then it stopped. After it stopped last I completely lost VVM and couldn't turn it on as it was greyed out. I went through the steps I mentioned above but wouldn't activate right away but eventually it activated later that day. I never tested it but early this week both were working for me and that was before the last phone update and the August Android update on Wednesday.

One other thing I did last week was go into play store, searched for phone app and clicked on the Google phone app, I tapped on uninstall. This uninstalls the last update, I then updated it again and not sure if that helped before doing the other suggestions.

[5hole03]

No, still not working! After the Aug. update, I again tried every trouble shooting suggestion and none worked. I have, several times uninstalled the phone app updates, reinstalled but that has not helped. My pixel 9 pro just says, "activating voicemay" but nothing ever happens. 

[DeanKevin64]

I don't know what the secret is to get this to actually activate. In the last month since mine has stopped working I have managed to get it going again but it lasts one VM and then it either greys out the on/off VVM toggle or it just deactivates. A week and a half ago Monday was the last time it wasn't working, had a message and nothing. I couldn't get it to activate again that Monday but later in the week I tried again and it activated. On Monday or Tuesday this week a voice message was left and got te notification and it was on the VVM list to play. I think it was even before I got the August update and the last phone app update. Too bad you can't get it working.

As mentioned by another poster you can set up YouMail, it gives you a free number to forward your unanswered calls to. I think Google Voice works the same way. I did set up a YouMail account and was going to try it then I didn't like the idea of another phone number so I cancel call forwarding and deleted the account. I don't get that many calls so I figured I will just call into VM as it didn't take that much effort to do that, it is just inconvenient.

[5hole03]

Good Morning 

I don't get that many call either, so like you, I just call my voice mail. Just based though, on the number of complaints I see on both the Reddit & Visible talk groups sometime is going on. Whether it was an update,  Pixel phones, Verizon or Visible, I just wish it would get fixed!! 

[DeanKevin64]

I do to. I think mine is temporarily fixed but then I thought I had it fixed like 3 times now, it works on one call and 4 to 5 days later when I get another message I get nothing. I know when it first quit working on my 9A I started doing Google searches and noticed a number of Reddit post about this in the a few different Google/Pixel subs. It seems like it isn't just Visible/Verizon, I saw mention of T-Mobile and Mint also, not sure if I saw any mention of AT&T though, seems widespread to Pixel phones over the last year or two. I would think if it is Verizon/Visible then no ones VM/VVM would work, it just seems like random devices, mainly Pixel, although I did see mention of Motorola once or twice. It does seem like it is leaning towards an update with either the July Android update since mine seemed to have stopped working after I downloaded it. But can't say that is it though because of all the old post. Must be a Pixel thing. I did send feedback to Google about this issue last month. Maybe if enough people send in about this issue maybe it will get a more permanent fix. 

[jpind]

I'm a new customer and got a prompt for my mailbox number when I called VM.  Phone number would not work as a mailbox.  I linked up to Visible chat on the website and worked with the agent.  She first tried resetting my password which did not work.  I had read the forums so asked her for a VM reset which she did.  The first two attempts at entering my cell phone number as the box number did not work but the third attempt at calling VM I didn't get a prompt for the mailbox number, only for the password which she had set and given to me. It worked fine.  I've tried several times in the last few hours after chat and all is working well.  I've not tried visual VM yet as I rarely use my VM.  I hade a very short wait for a chat agent and my total time with her was less than 5 minutes.