FNB Connect - iMessage not activating.

[iEverything]

Experienced recent disaster lasting 6 weeks to migrate to them.

They seemed to have finally sorted out all the issues except it appears they have an issue that either their sim or your mobile number on the sim is not displayed / passed through to iMessage when trying to activate it so all you end up with is your email address being used and iMessage activation failure.

Pop a Voda sim in and iMessage sees it immediately.

Anyone else experiencing this?

 

[airborne]

Mtn contract guys have a similar issue, something to do with intl sms not allowed with free sms/data etc, solution was load some prepaid airtime which allows an intl sms for imessage activation to be sent and activation happens immediately.

 

[TedLasso]

Experienced recent disaster lasting 6 weeks to migrate to them.

They seemed to have finally sorted out all the issues except it appears they have an issue that either their sim or your mobile number on the sim is not displayed / passed through to iMessage when trying to activate it so all you end up with is your email address being used and iMessage activation failure.

Pop a Voda sim in and iMessage sees it immediately.

Anyone else experiencing this?

Had the same issue for days when I switched from MTN to FNB prepaid. I initially bought voice , data and SMSs. iMessage never activated on cell number. Bought some airtime and it activated. They could never figure it out despite many attempts. Reason is iMessage activation is an international SMS.

They should pay me for figuring it out for them.

BTW, It's better to buy Airtime than buying SMS or voice because it never expires. if you use SMS or voice on phone it subtracts it from airtime credit.

 

[SauRoNZA]

Yup you need to have international SMS enabled.

Vodacom just happens to have this on by default.

 

[moedawood]

Yup you need to have international SMS enabled.

Vodacom just happens to have this on by default.

International Sms is enabled by default for all from my understanding. The issue is that international SMS is not covered by the bundles, rather airtime is required. R 1.60 is the cost of the SMS required to activate iMessage on MTN. Not sure what the charges are on the other networks.

 

[SauRoNZA]

Yeah it goes without saying that you would need airtime.

 

[iEverything]

Thanks for all the replies...

The situation is we cannot buy airtime because we are on a Flexi contract which only allows bundles to be bought

Looking @ itemised billing you can see the International sms are being sent to Apple @ +44.. for the iMessage activation requests yet it never activates....another fight coming with FNB there because they screwed up the migration for 5 days.

What seems very strange is that the sim mobile number does not even appear in iMessage with the spinning wheel like it normally would when trying to activate, popped the sim into my iPhone and same thing no number appears

This was a MTN number that got migrated

We have seriously had enough and want to just go Cell C prepaid

Can you also believe that FNB Connect only works office hours and till 1pm on Saturday so if you have an issue with your sim / contract outside of those hours you have to just wait, so when my wife's phone stopped working on the 1st we could do nothing until they 'opened' on the 3rd.

quick question....does anyone know if you go Cell C prepaid can you activate iMessage in that Cell C will send the international sms to Apple for activation or will be have a similar problem on all prepaid providers.

 

[TedLasso]

Thanks for all the replies...

The situation is we cannot buy airtime because we are on a Flexi contract which only allows bundles to be bought

Looking @ itemised billing you can see the International sms are being sent to Apple @ +44.. for the iMessage activation requests yet it never activates....another fight coming with FNB there because they screwed up the migration for 5 days.

What seems very strange is that the sim mobile number does not even appear in iMessage with the spinning wheel like it normally would when trying to activate, popped the sim into my iPhone and same thing no number appears

This was a MTN number that got migrated

We have seriously had enough and want to just go Cell C prepaid

Can you also believe that FNB Connect only works office hours and till 1pm on Saturday so if you have an issue with your sim / contract outside of those hours you have to just wait, so when my wife's phone stopped working on the 1st we could do nothing until they 'opened' on the 3rd.

quick question....does anyone know if you go Cell C prepaid can you activate iMessage in that Cell C will send the international sms to Apple for activation or will be have a similar problem on all prepaid providers.

An idea - not sure if it will help
1.
Log into banking and then change your sim contract to allow international numbers and allow roaming. See if your sim limits allows you to exceed you flex package limit.

2.Turn off iMessage on phone

3. Disconnect wifi on phone

4. On phone, toggle airplane mode off and on, so SIM gets updated settings when logging into network. Or restart phone.

5. Attempt to activate iMessage again.

Hope this helps.

 

[airborne]

Thanks for all the replies...

The situation is we cannot buy airtime because we are on a Flexi contract which only allows bundles to be bought

Looking @ itemised billing you can see the International sms are being sent to Apple @ +44.. for the iMessage activation requests yet it never activates....another fight coming with FNB there because they screwed up the migration for 5 days.

What seems very strange is that the sim mobile number does not even appear in iMessage with the spinning wheel like it normally would when trying to activate, popped the sim into my iPhone and same thing no number appears

This was a MTN number that got migrated

We have seriously had enough and want to just go Cell C prepaid

Can you also believe that FNB Connect only works office hours and till 1pm on Saturday so if you have an issue with your sim / contract outside of those hours you have to just wait, so when my wife's phone stopped working on the 1st we could do nothing until they 'opened' on the 3rd.

quick question....does anyone know if you go Cell C prepaid can you activate iMessage in that Cell C will send the international sms to Apple for activation or will be have a similar problem on all prepaid providers.

That is shoddy, customer support needs to be 24/7 for a operator. Was thinking of going Fnb connect, considering this and how they increased the prices thank goodness I didn't.

 

[MagicDude4Eva]

FWIW: I have the same issue with CellC since September 2015. iMessages stopped working then and will not activate. It worked perfectly fine before that and Apple confirms that the activation message does not arrive. CellC is incapable of helping and I have given up on iMessage. Strangely once in a while I flick it on and off and then it will work for a few days and then stop again.

It seems to be a SIM and number issue. Someone has also mentioned that there could be an issue with WASPA erroneously having blocked the number.

 

[iEverything]

That is shoddy, customer support needs to be 24/7 for a operator. Was thinking of going Fnb connect, considering this and how they increased the prices thank goodness I didn't.

Don't move, I am a staunch FNB supporter and this experience has seriously tarnished how I view them.

They are not geared to be able to give the support that is required in terms of being a mobile operator

Pricing is fantastic, my wife was going to get 100 minutes, 1GB data and 50 sms for R247 a month and on a month to month basis but no money is worth what our experience has been.

It has taken me 37 days to get hold of someone I just got off the phone with who can actually help us cancel everything now and we have literally called every day in this time period.

 

[iEverything]

FWIW: I have the same issue with CellC since September 2015. iMessages stopped working then and will not activate. It worked perfectly fine before that and Apple confirms that the activation message does not arrive. CellC is incapable of helping and I have given up on iMessage. Strangely once in a while I flick it on and off and then it will work for a few days and then stop again.

It seems to be a SIM and number issue. Someone has also mentioned that there could be an issue with WASPA erroneously having blocked the number.

Pls don't tell me there are similar issues with Cell C and iMessage....

I called them this morning to ask if on prepaid and with airtime loaded "I"/ iMessage will be able to send and receive that international sms and they told me yes so I am about to go out and take a CellC USIM on prepaid and put this FNB nightmare behind me

By all accounts it would seem CellC seems the best option in terms of prepaid...am I correct? only used them for prepaid 100GB data @ home on a LTE router and I believe the FNB backend is CellC and whilst on FNB coverage was great

 

[MagicDude4Eva]

Pls don't tell me there are similar issues with Cell C and iMessage....

I called them this morning to ask if on prepaid and with airtime loaded "I"/ iMessage will be able to send and receive that international sms and they told me yes so I am about to go out and take a CellC USIM on prepaid and put this FNB nightmare behind me

By all accounts it would seem CellC seems the best option in terms of prepaid...am I correct? only used them for prepaid 100GB data @ home on a LTE router and I believe the FNB backend is CellC and whilst on FNB coverage was great

My iMessage worked for two years and stopped in September 2015. Never got it working since then. Both the wife and the kid have also been on CellC pre-paid and don't have an issue. I think my issue started when something happened to my number. When I use another pre-paid SIM/number iMessage activates immediately. I don't really want to give up my number as it is one of those unique numbers.

CellC gave me the best coverage in Broadacres (neither MTN nor Vodacom worked) - don't know if this has changed over the last 2 years - everyone in my surrounds is on CellC and has no issues.

 

[iEverything]

Great, thanks for the feedback

 

[airborne]

My iMessage worked for two years and stopped in September 2015. Never got it working since then. Both the wife and the kid have also been on CellC pre-paid and don't have an issue. I think my issue started when something happened to my number. When I use another pre-paid SIM/number iMessage activates immediately. I don't really want to give up my number as it is one of those unique numbers.

CellC gave me the best coverage in Broadacres (neither MTN nor Vodacom worked) - don't know if this has changed over the last 2 years - everyone in my surrounds is on CellC and has no issues.

Have you tried a sim swop?
Worth a go if you haven't

 

[aimz]

Yup you need to have international SMS enabled.

Vodacom just happens to have this on by default.

I did that and it's still not working...
Can't top up airtime because my contract only allows bundles.

 

[shadow_man]

I can’t get iMessage working on FNB… have bought SMS’s, airtime and still no luck - just hangs activating.

 

[carl.heymann]

Same here, made sure that international dialling is enabled on the FNB site, loaded airtime, checked settings.
Error message is immediate wen trying to activate iMessage.

 

[b1scu1t]

Has anyone figured out what's wrong with FNB not being able to activate iMessage?
Been stuck trying to activate it for over a year.

I upgraded to a new iPhone few days ago, and the Telkom eSIM activated immediately, but the FNB SIM hangs on activating indefinitely.
I put a Vodacom SIM in my old phone, and it also activated immediately.

And yes there is airtime on the SIM.
I'd load like R10 airtime and it would repeatedly try to activate until the airtime is finished.