Temporarily Disable Wireless (cell) voicemail

[cirwin58]

I would like to know if there is a way to have voicemail on my cell (I have a Samsung Galaxy S21+) 
either very temporarily “turned off “ ( like I can with my landline)  or some type of “ do not disturb” 

even some blocked numbers are leaving voicemails & I prefer people to leave messages on my landline (I am a senior) but I do not want to cancel it

Thank you

Chris

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[Pauly · Accepted solution]

Back in the day Voicemail was a chargeable add on you would subscribe to, which would give you the service provisioned on your account, You could simply remove the voicemail feature back in the day.

Todays plans have the voicemail included in the plan SOC code. The only known way to have voicemail disabled is to call into a customer service agent and ask if they are able to go into the plan and put an exclusion on the voicemail feature.  I do not know if they still do this so it would probably be best to call in to one of their agents and ask them if they can do it for you.

Good luck

[57]

As mentioned above, there is no way to temporarily turn VM on/off, say, on a daily or weekly basis.  What you could do perhaps is to ask people to call your home number in your out-going message?

I have voicemail turned off completely on my PAYGo (pay as you go) phone in order to save money because I pay for any calls by the minute.  Any callers cannot leave a message, and they don't get a personalized message, they simply hear "this number is not available for VM" or something like that - perhaps they don't hear anything other than a hangup after a number of rings, I can't remember because it's been 13 years since I turned VM off.   I check my incoming call log, which often has spam callers, but if someone calls that's in my directory or if it's a number I recognize, I call them back (or text) when I have time at my convenience.

This works for me since I don't use my phone much (hence the PAYGo) plan, so this may not work for most people who use their phones a lot.

[Pauly]

Pay As You Go (also referred to by some people as PayGo or Prepaid) has voicemail which can be turned On or Off just like Postpaid plans but They use a different billing platform and agents with different skill set to do it. but either way it can be done on both platforms, just call in and ask

[cirwin58]

I have spoken to Rogers & hope there is a way soon to stop blocked calls from going to voicemail. I thank everyone for their responses but I think there should be a feature that prevents this at the network level in conjunction with the phone manufacturers.

I do not think I should have to change my number or cancel voicemail feature as there should be better protection in this day & age. Thank you to all for the suggestions & replies

[Pauly]

Just why not call in and disable your voice mail?  we live in a society lately where if someone calls me and gets my voice mail prompt, they do not even leave a message. Instead people will simply hang up and text or email me.

[Klotar]

Another possible work-around is to let your voicemail box fill up.  I only have storage for 5 saved voicemails on my plan/account and after those 5 are saved, no one can leave any more.  To enable voicemail, just delete one or more saved messages.  To disable voicemail, call yourself and leave a couple messages.

I know, I know - SILLY!  But is it...?  Hmmm...

[57]

I'm not sure whether this applies to all or just some plans, however, voicemail is not kept forever.  I believe there is a 10 day limit on some plans. Therefore you'd have to "refill" your VM box with messages.