Telkom Mobile SMS delivery problem
Some users on the Telkom Mobile network may find their SMS messages to subscribers on other networks delayed by hours or even days.
This is according to an e-mail exchange between a user, Telkom Mobile customer service, and Huawei technical support.
The problem report stated that SMS messages were usually delivered without a problem as long as the receiving device is switched on.
When the receiving device is switched off, however, text messages could be delayed anywhere from a few hours to over two days.
According to the user that reported the issue, the problem went through several phases:
- It started off with any SMS message he sent returning with a delivery failure message;
- After reporting the issue, message delivery to 082 numbers and ported numbers was delayed, but others seemed to deliver when the phones are switched on.
- The issue was resolved for a time.
- The problem from phase 2 returned.
A Huawei technical support representative quoted in the e-mail chain explained that there was a particular problem with ported numbers.
The person from Huawei support said that there was no “NP Prefix” in the alert message that tells the short message service centre (SMSC) that a pending message must be delivered.
He said that the alert they receive is in the format “277455555555”, but in the forward message the format is (NP Prefix)+27+MSISDN (cellphone number).
On 4 September, the support contact at Telkom Mobile to whom the user was speaking, forwarded a message to the support contact at Vodacom, saying that the people responsible for fixing the issue will know what needs to be done in a week.
On Monday, 16 September 2013 (today), after requesting feedback, Huawei explained that there was a problem updating the support ticket and they plan to fix this issue tonight.
If it is fixed tonight, it would have taken a month and a half to resolve the issue since it was first reported.
Telkom Mobile was asked for feedback on the issue and how it was attended to, but did not provide feedback by the time of publication.
Thanks to Rudie for sending this in
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