Callwave 1, Verizon 0

I've been using Callwave for about a year because a) I hate voicemail -- that's what email is for, b) I never check my voicemail as a direct result of (a), and c) just don't leave me a voicemail; I saw that you called, and if it were urgent you would have text'd me.

Anyway, I've decided that, at this point, I'm away from my computer enough that it's no longer worth it and I just end up calling the person anyway, and since the voice-to-text option became a feature only available by upgrade, I'm dropping off. Seems easy enough to bail on a service you don't pay for, right? Ask Verizon.

Let me be clear that it is completely my fault that I did not search for my own solution to the busy signal that existed where my Callwave message used to be. I simply deleted the account information I had listed with Callwave, and then when I realized that didn't automatically reset my subscriber VM message, I [stupidly] called Verizon.

Call number one to Verizon consisted of a polite customer service person who tried to walk me through setting my voicemail preferences on my mobile. I continued to explain [that I'm not an idiot] and eventually was directed to the tech department. Again, I explained, and this polite employee decided that resetting my VM was the answer. I attempted to elaborate that, while I appreciate the effort, if my voicemail was never deactivated, more like re-routed, then I'm guessing activating it again is not the answer. I played along anyway. No luck. Polite person number three explained that some servers were down and that unfortunately the process that will restore my original answering service will be unavailable for 24 hours. Luckily though, they can call me back, rather than visa-versa. Sure enough, I got a call back about 4 hours after I had asked them to call me, and the process was completed. Once again, no luck. So, my current polite person informed me that they will be looking into the problem and get back to me within 48 hours. I'm assuming they never found a solution as it's been 8 days and I finally decided that I could probably have more luck on my own.

So, here's the answer that I found after 30 seconds of looking and wish I had searched for myself 8 days ago, in case you ever need to deactivate a Callwave account because your carrier will not help:

a) Please find your deactivation code(s) in the table below.
b) Dial the code(s) as you would a phone number
c) Press "Send" on your phone to dial that number.
d) Repeat steps b) and c) if there are multiple codes for your carrier

Wireless Carrier or Network
Deactivation Codes

AT&T Cingular, T-Mobile, GSM network
##004#

Verizon, CDMA network
*73
*900
*920

TDMA Network
*740
*730

Bluegrass, Midwest Wireless
*900
*920

Cellcom
*680

Cincinnati Bell
##004#

Midwest Wireless
*90##
*92##

US Cellular
*740

:) bk