Q: My iMessage still says "Waiting for activation..."

Hello, I am in Mexico too and I have the same issue. My carrier is also Iusacell, I switched from Telcel a couple of weeks ago. I have followed all tips I have found (reset all settings, update My Phone settings, verify my contact info in the iphone, verify my phone information in my Apple account, restore in dfu with/wo sim...etc) several times and still no luck!. I checked my sent sms messages and I have sent more than 40 to the international number 00447786205094 where the service should be registered and doesn't work!!!!

I have a friend with Telcel and he could activate correctly iMessage option at his first attempt, he has his email and phone number in the "Receive at" section and it works really well, so at least I know it works for some people. If you change the SIM card or find another solution please post it.

Another cause for this could be google voice integration if you have the Sprint iPhone

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS4091

For anyone in Mexico having trouble with iusacell, I´m thinking it has something to do with porting the number from Telcel, and the iphone being associated with it´s original iusacell number, if you notice when its trying to activate, at least in my case it´s trying to activate to the number assigned by iusacell originally not to the ported number.

I´ve been trying to activate for over 2 weeks, so far:

Clean restore 3 times, didn´t help.

Changed SIM twice, (80Mxp) each time, then only thing this helped with is the phone now automatically recognizes my ported number wich it didn´t on the original sim, (the original sim, kept showing the original number until i changed it manually).

Reset netowork settings,or  registering over 3G didn´t help either.

So far Iusacell support blames apple and is not giving a soulution, strange because Telcel appears to be working fine.ç

The service will work over email though. just select a mail in the "receive at" but I think this makes it work only with people who activated the mail as well.

Hello,

I am using an officially/factory unlocked (SIM free) iPhone 4, running iOS 5.0.1.

In the past I have been using iMessage with no special issues, but as for now, I am not able to activate it, and it is keep saying either "Waiting for activation..." or that the activation failed (unsuccessful).

The only thing that I have done, prior to having this issue, is inserting a different SIM card (of the same mobile operator, which is an "approved" operator) into the phone, for about 1 minute.

After I put back my original SIM card, iMessage stopped working.

Please note that I refer to using iMessage with my PHONE NUMBER as an identifier and NOT my e-mail address / Apple ID.

I have tried searching the web for a solution, and tried doing the following things (not in this specific order):
* Erasing all Network Settings.
* Disabling all Restrictions.
* Re-entering my phone number at Settings --> Phone --> My Number (note: I tried entering my phone both WITH and WITHOUT the "+Country Code")
* Creating a contact with my own phone number listed as "iPhone" and pointing to that contact through Settings --> Mail, Contacts, Calendars --> My Info
* Turning my phone off and on
* Re-connecting my iPhone to iTunes
* Taking the SIM card out for 1-2 minutes (both when the phone is off and on) and then re-inserting it

None of the above seemed to solve the issue.

As I am NOT willing to erase all my phone's content and having to re-configure and re-install everything, is there anything else you can suggest to try out?

Thanks in advance!

I have the same issue with 2 units out of 9 brand new iPhone 4s units I just got for my office. As a developer, I used the console from XCode. Guess what, the devices with the fault try sending the activation SMS, but the response gets somehow malformed by something along the way, thus the iPhone 4s cannot interpret the command. If I switch the SIMM from device to device the one with the SIMM keeps failing, so it is not the device, but the profile associated with the SIMM, most probably at the carrier level, somewhere on their switch or IT provisining system. I can take the old SIMM from iPhone 4s back to iPhone 4 and still have the same problem, so it is not the SIMM, but the profile for that particular phone number and associated services at the carrier side. Now, geting your carrier to listen is a different story... or even if they listen, having a listener with knowledge on the other side of the call is a monumental task. BTW, I don't think is an APPLE issue at all...

Although I'm not a developer, I tend to agree with you.  I'm using an iPhone4 with iOS5 on Verizon.  No SIMM.  Still should be the same issue, right?

I'm able to use the iMessage and Facetime on a DIFFERENT mobile number on my account, but not on my particular mobile number that I need it to work on.  How do I go about explaining this to tech support at Verizon?

Thanks!

I would begin by asking them to tell you how can it be possible to have two devices under the same account, one working as advertised and not the other. The only way they can respond to you is by comparing the profiles being feed to the switch by their provisioning systems.

This is very high level and will not be accomplished at the store level. It must be persistence via the phone support systems and by insisting that they provide you with an escalation ticket or case number. This way, you can always refer to the number and they can see the amount of time or effort if any on their side.

Other than that, if they don't listen; you can always try by letting them know that their are not fulfilling their side of the agreement.

Good luck...

By the way, I have the issue of reference in iPhone 4 with iOS 5.0, 5.0.1 and 5.1 Beta 1 AND iPhone 4S with all three versions of the iOS; both devices have different SIMM's but both SIMM's have been assigned the same telephone number, first for almost a year with the 4, recently for 3 weeks on the 4S.

My iMessage don't have the phone number and only e-mails.. can someone help me? I have read the whole page (1-9) but none solved the problems

Similar problem here. Used to have an iPhone 4 from Telcel (Mexico), prepaid mode, and got a 4S last weekend from Iusacell, also in prepaid mode. I backed up my iPhone 4, restored it, and gave my cousin a nice "almost new" iPhone 4 as a Christmas present. Now, in the 4S neither iMessage nor Facetime activate, and they show my old Telcel number (which my cousin is now using).

I've tried a lot of possible solutions and none of them has worked. I think I could also try to ask my cousin to deactivate iMessage & Facetime on her iPhone 4, turn it off, do the same on my 4S, then power up my 4S and try to activate both services. Also, I read the problem could be an "old" Iusacell microSIM (it's v4.0, whereas Iusacell's newest is v5.0, or at least it is in "normal" SIMs, as I have one on my Samsung Galaxy S II).

Any other possible solutions?

EDIT: The 4S shows my old Telcel number only on iMessage and Facetime, General Settings show the correct Iusacell number.

Check with your Mobile providers, Apparently there are some settings that the mobile carriers have to enable. iMessage and Facetime activation goes thru in a jiffy if the Mobile carrier is in a tie up with apple.

I tried activating both using a sim card of a mobile network which does not sell iPhones from their stores and I got a message eternally as waiting for activation even thought I have a 3G data pack on.

But Once I inserted the sim card of an alternate number from a mobile carrier which is selling iPhones from their stores, it took seconds to activate even over a 2G network.

The same things goes for Cellular data network settings. It is controlled from the carrier end. If they enable it one can enter the APN entry for 3G connectivity or else it is normal GPRS and the option is missing on the phone.

I Am in iusacell, mexico, apparently its a problem with the carrier, but they wont admit it, like many of you i didnt port my number from another company, the problem appeared when they changed the sim from v3 to v5,   any solution?

You are correct in your statement, nonetheless;  I have 2 iPhone 4, and 2 iPhone 4S, I also have two SIM cards from an Apple authorized carrier. One SIM card cannot activate iMessage and Facetime on any of the 4 devices while the other SIM card can activate both services on all 4 devices. Both SIM cards are brand new provided by the carrier with the iPhone 4S.

This is a Carrier issue, near or arround the SMS profile that has been provisioned to the switch.

On the issue of IUSACELL:

When I connected my iPhone to iTunes on my computer today, it by chance happened to announce there was a carrier update, which I performed on my current 3GS. Lo-and-behold, I soon after received the following text message back when trying to verify iMessage:

"Numero Destino no recibe ReK2 00447786205094"

(translation: Destination number does not receive SMS 00447786205094)

So either Iusacell has effectively blocked the number, or whatever service this number happens to be on in the United Kingdom (+44), no longer has an operator agreement with Iusacell that will allow our text messages to be verified at the UK Apple server or wherever this number is.

And then, failing either of the last cases, and to be frank? I find it RIDICULOUS that Apple would have us sending EXPENSIVE verification SMS messages all the way to the United Kingdom in the first place. I suspect this is related to some mistake in the coding for iMessage with the release of iOS 5.0.1 as it is no small coincidence that this is around the time that my iPhone stopped performing back-ups to the iCloud server as well as having lost phone number verification on iMessage.

Who is to blame? I don't know... but I guess I'll be digging around for a U.S. based number through which iMessage can possibly be verified, and then see if I can't somehow change the number through which my iMessage is trying to verify through...

A similar thing happened to me yesterday. I decided to restore my Iusacell iPhone 4S on iTunes and set it up as a new iPhone, and when it was ready, a pop-up appeared telling me of new carrier settings, which I accepted and were installed. Then when I activated the iPhone, I also skipped the iTunes Account proccess (neither did I create a new one nor set up my existing one).

Immediately after activating it, in the home screen, the well known pop-up saying that my carrier might charge me additional costs for international messages to activate Facetime. I accepted it and waited. After a few minutes, the iPhone received that exact same SMS about the "Rek2" with the international number, and through the night, I received 4 more of these messages, then I checked and effectively, the iMessage and Facetime activation was a failure. I think I'll try to contact later the Iusacell Chat or something, or maybe even go to the Iusacell CAE where I got the iPhone, and not leave until they give me a plausible solution.