Who I have the same questioned this topic

I had my phone stolen in Vietnam and now I'm in South Korea until the 23rd.

I needed a new phone ASAP, but South Korean mobile system uses the GSM, while verizon uses CDMA.

Since I was happy with Verizon's service, I decided to stay loyal and ordered the phone, had it shipped to my friend's place and have him send it to Korea for me.

And all the while, I made sure I talked to a several support representatives and they all confirmed that I am able to activate my phone here in Korea. Two of them asked their supervisor and confirmed on this. They also said *611 will not charge me for international fees. (I wanted to make sure so I had all the chat transcripts sent to my email and ridiculously, none of them were sent. I don't even know why they have that button up in that window)

Fastfoward to today when I received my phone. I was still a bit afraid to disable my airplane mode as my service plan does not include the global coverage and I didn't want to get bombed with ridiculous charges. I talked to a customer representative, as I couldn't activate it over internet because it says "Pending Order". Then she says it's impossible to activate my phone outside of the US.

This is so infuriating as I need to use this phone ASAP. Please let me know if there's a way to activate this phone. Thanks in advance