Problem with Text Messages

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I've been having some problems receiving text messages from one specific number (both my number and the sender's are Vodafone numbers). Both my inbox and outbox are almost empty.

What's been happening is this: I might receive an SMS, and the text of the message is fine. Then I get a second SMS from the same person and the 1st SMS "changes" itself and half of the text goes missing, and I get a *\Missing Text\* in its place. The weird thing is that I don't always get any notification that the 2nd message has arrived, unless I switch the phone off and on again. Then, I might get a third message, the 2nd one goes "missing" (I either get a blank page or a *\Missing Text\*), and the 1st one might have "part-merged" with the 2nd one (1st half of 1st SMS = Part text of 1st SMS, 2nd half of 1st SMS = Part text of 2st SMS, with or without *\Missing Text\*). Some of the SMS texts never arrive at all. I've tried to delete some of those messages (even thought I've tons of room), and from time to time, for a little while only, some of the messages might regain the full text.

I haven't seen any pattern to this, except that they are all coming from the same sender (it's not happening with other numbers). This happens also when the texts are being sent a few days apart (for instance, an SMS I got today "modified" an SMS I got last December.

Today I rang the Vodafone helpdesk and I was told my SIM card might have to be changed 'cause it was a bit old and to go to a Vodafone store to get my phone checked too - basically, they didn't know what was causing the problem. I told them I thought it was silly to change something just because "It's a bit old", especially considering that the problem is limited to only one number, and only on incoming SMSs - I felt they just wanted to get money off me for getting the phone checked out, transferring numbers and data to a new SIM, and basically "trying" to fix something that didn't need to be fixed, frankly.

Does anybody know what could be causing this problem? Has anyone else come across the same thing? Do I really need to have my phone checked out and my SIM changed?

Many thanks.

Davy

It wont cost you to change the sim. You are entitled to a free replacement sim, which i would probably do. Just transfer any contacts to the phone first. Try that first before doing anything else.

TheAlmightyZeus

Something similar happened to me when I was without a phone last year and had to use a spare Siemens C55

I was getting alot of texts from a specific number and when I looked back over previous message they would start to become jumbled especially if the texts I were receiving were bigger than a single message (160 characters). It's an old phone and I can only presume that it couldn't handle the flood of long messages that were coming in.

What phone are you using yourself? If it's fairly old might be a good idea to look at upgrading.

Rsaeire

I would imagine that only your friend in question is sending you multiple sms/joined sms and as such, your handset, which I would imagine is old, especially given your statement "I told them I thought it was silly to change something just because 'It's a bit old'," is unable to display them correctly.

Older handsets do not always support multiple sms/joined sms, so you would require new handset in order to receive sms that contain than 160 characters.

I recommend testing your current sim in a relatively new Vodafone handset; this can be done in Vodafone store if you don't have a relatively new Vodafone handset available. If the issue still occurs, you can ask for a sim replacement. If the issue does not occur, you will then know your phone is at fault.

New Home

Thanks folks.

The phone is a Motorola V300, it's less than 4 years old and I've had no problem with it before (the SIM is much older, though); I've been receiving 3- or 4-pages-long messages from other numbers with no difficulties at all, and this problem happens only with one number and with short messages too (3 or 4 words-long).