Missing Txtmsgs.

May 29, 2006 4:57 PM

TxtmsgFilter: Why can't my best friend receive my txt msgs?

She's got Sprint, I've got Verizon.

It's very mysterious, everyone's txt msgs get through to her but mine. She has yet to get a single message (text or photo) that I have tried to send. This is not urgent or life-threatening, but it is incredibly annoying.

Also mysterious: this doesn't happen to me with anyone else. It's not a problem with my physical phone, I switched phones recently and she still doesn't get messages, and she receives messages from other people with Verizon just fine. Likewise, no one else I know on Sprint is unable to get my messages.

I'd like to be able to fix this if possible, but I'd really just like to know WHY this happens.

posted by grapefruitmoon to Technology (11 answers total)

Why don't you call Verizon customer support? It's obviously a problem with their systems. As far as I know, they're supposed to relay all messages from one provider to another. Can someone else with Verizon coverage text to her, or is it just you?
posted by SpecialK at 5:49 PM on May 29, 2006

In the UK, you sometimes can't receive them until you've sent at least one.

Maybe the same applies? Has she tried to send?
posted by Mwongozi at 5:49 PM on May 29, 2006

Do you have her 10-digit phone number entered in your phonebook? This happened with my daughter and me - we couldn't text each other and discovered it was because the phone numbers we had entered were only 7-digits long (without the area code). Entering them in our phonebooks as the complete 10-digit numbers fixed our problem.
posted by nelvana at 6:00 PM on May 29, 2006

Do you have the right number?
posted by divabat at 6:20 PM on May 29, 2006

Maybe her service has some sort of blocking that can be turned on per number, and she accidently blocked text messages from your number.
posted by clarissajoy at 6:22 PM on May 29, 2006

Response by poster: nelvana & divabat: Yes, I have the right number. I have no problems calling her (with the 10 digit number as we live in different states), I just can't send txt messages.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 6:29 PM on May 29, 2006

For a while, I stopped getting messages from my girlfriend. She's the only person I would message with, so I don't know if other people could send me messages. T-mobile support suggested taking the battery out of the phone and putting it back in. To my surprise, it worked.
posted by dsword at 7:49 PM on May 29, 2006

Along the lines of what nelvana said, do you have a 1 before the area code of the number you have saved in your contacts (12125551234 instead of 2125551234)? This same exact thing was happening to me until I figured out my friend saved her number in my phone with as 11 digits instead of 10.
posted by Venadium at 10:12 PM on May 29, 2006

Response by poster: dsword: I've switched phones (and consequently, phone numbers) since the problem began and the problem still continues.

Venadium: All of my numbers are programmed into my phone in 10 digit format.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 5:30 AM on May 30, 2006

Do you have your phone set up to block your number from the recipient's caller ID? I have my phone set up that way, so unless I enter *82 prior to a phone number my number displays as "private caller" or whatever - sometimes this interferes with my ability to send texts to certain people.
posted by KAS at 7:03 AM on May 30, 2006

I've switched phones (and consequently, phone numbers) since the problem began and the problem still continues.

Wow. You switched phones and phone numbers, and it's still only you that has the problem? That's really strange! I can only think of two possibilities:

1) Your/her location (seems unlikely given your mutual successes with messages to/from others). Do you know if messages work when you travel?

2) That her entry for you in her phonebook is corrupted somehow. I assume she updated it when you got a new phone, so that might explain why this phone doesn't work either. Try having her take out her battery (my problem was on the receiving end). If that doesn't work, maybe she can try deleting her entry for you in her phone book and replacing it with a new one?
posted by dsword at 10:01 PM on May 30, 2006