iMessage "delivered" but not received

I've had a 5c for a month. It is the phone I use for my therapy practice. It is a piece of crap. My texts are not being received by people nor am I receiving texts. If I turn off imessage and a patient with an iphone sends me an imessage - I don't receive it. Being out of communication with patients is intolerable. I so regret getting an Apple product.

I have the same problem from the other side. I need to send important messages to someone who frequently has to disable their phone while they work. If this happens, my messages don't automatically send once that person is connected to wi-fi again, they just sit undelivered, or will deliver at some point in the distant future. If - on the occasions I notice that 'delivered' hasn't appeared below the message after several hours - I send them as text messages, they sometimes take over a day to get through via the network operator.

I've used the iPhone since it's first inception and own a mac, but the decline in the functionality of Apple products, and the feeling that they now spend more effort trying to keep problems quiet rather than bothering to fix them -along with the awful, awful, ugly, half baked iOS7 - has ensured that I will never buy another Apple product again. If iMessage doesn't work then it shouldn't even be offered as an option. What is the point of a phone that you cannot rely on to perform basic communication with?

There can be some multiple device confusion if you or your friend have a MacBook sitting at home that has iMessage activated and signed-in while you are outdoors using the iPhone. If your iPhone is not using Wi-Fi (while the MacBook is simultaneously using WiFi) then iMessages won't need to revert to SMS because it sees your account is using WiFi somewhere and thus messages can end up being received at the laptop at home and not your iPhone.

That happened to me. I found the missing iMessages from my friend at home on the MacBook which was turned on/ signed-in to Messages app and near WiFi. iMessages were marked as delivered on my friends iPhone even though the messages never came to my waiting iPhone which was outdoors and not near WiFi. iMessages are apparently marked "delivered" if messages makes it through to ANY device that you have activated with your email address. iMessage certainly won't check to see if ALL your devices received the messages before marking them delivered.

So, I signed-out of iMessage on the MacBook, (but kept the account activated). This is just another potential piece of the puzzle of confusion which can develop and may not solve all iMessage problems.

Another issue is that Apple seems to automatically add a few email addresses such was joe.mac and .me addresses to your iMessage account when you're activating. If you don't remove those and they are not in your friend's contact information for you then iMessages appear to come from an unknown email addresses.

this is a problem I've also encountered - if you're trying to text someone on their iPhone who is out of internet signal but within texting coverage it will still go through as an iMessage if they are signed in elsewhere and they don't get it until later. A workaround for people you know have multiple apple devices is to ask them to go into message settings and un-tick their iPhone mobile number as an iMessage contact then to set up a new contact with only their mobile number (not email) and use that for texting them. It's not a very elegant solution and but at least then you know they'll get it as an SMS when you send it rather than thinking they've got an iMessage and finding out they haven't. This obviously isn't much use if the person you're trying to text isn't e.g. a family member or close friend you've already had this conversation with!! For people who really, really need to make sure messages don't disappear into the ether I guess the only solution is not to use iMessage at all.

This problem has still not been fixed? Wow...

I am a casual teacher who uses (not by choice) a text message booking service. Recently I found that some schools when trying to book me weren't receiving my text messages responding to their booking requests. This morning I received a booking which I responded to twice without getting an acknowledgement. I then went in & deactivated iMessage & responded again. They received my third (non-iMessage) response but by then it was too late & I missed out on a days work. I spoke to the support at the booking service who confirmed they only received the third response. What makes this even more infuriating is the fact that all of my responses were coloured green so there was no indication that any had failed, & it was only on a hunch that I decided to turn iMessage off & speak to the Support at the booking service. Each time this has happened it has cost me over $300 in wages. Thanks Apple.

karlfromnsw wrote:

This problem has still not been fixed? Wow...

I am a casual teacher who uses (not by choice) a text message booking service. Recently I found that some schools when trying to book me weren't receiving my text messages responding to their booking requests. This morning I received a booking which I responded to twice without getting an acknowledgement. I then went in & deactivated iMessage & responded again. They received my third (non-iMessage) response but by then it was too late & I missed out on a days work. I spoke to the support at the booking service who confirmed they only received the third response. What makes this even more infuriating is the fact that all of my responses were coloured green so there was no indication that any had failed, & it was only on a hunch that I decided to turn iMessage off & speak to the Support at the booking service. Each time this has happened it has cost me over $300 in wages. Thanks Apple.

Sounds like you need to do more troubleshooting, because iMessage works just fine for almost everyone. A few people may have issues, but those people need to troubleshoot the issue properly.

You're not required to use iMessage. iMessage requires an active cellular data connection or a wi-fi connection.

And you have the option to automatically enable 'Send as SMS' if sending as an iMessage fails.

Or you have the option to not use iMessage at all.

Hi! I had similar problems as well but it was between my phone and a friend's ipod. I sent him a chain of messages to see if it would go through and none did. After reading all the ways people tried to or successfully fixed this problem, I played around with my phone.

All I had to do was check mark my two other emails to be able to receive messages. Instantly my friend messaged me back, wondering why he only got it right now.

Not sure if it'll work for you... But just incase someone wants to try. ^^

I don't agree that iMessage works fine for almost everyone. iMessage works fine for me ...most of the time. But that's not good enough. I'd prefer it to not work at all. 3 messages I sent this week were never received even though my phone indicates they were delivered. This random failure whilst the phone gives you a sense of reassurance is not good enough at all. I have looked closely but cannot establish a pattern. The non delivered messages were to family members using iPhones all on ios9. I have gone through settings on all our phones, iPads and macs and they are as they should be. Further, messages are not fully syncing between my Mac, iPad and iPhone - again, most of them do but some don't.

I had the same issue last night! - Anyone have a clue as to what's going on there, and how to fix it or ensure it doesn't happen again?

The same is happening to me with one friend. All others work but iMessage shows that my message to her is delivered but she doesn't get them and vice versa.

Having similar issues. iMessage shows as delivered but not getting received. Random behaviour but making it very unreliable. Need a fix if anyone knows one.

I had a similar problem. Receiving Phone couldnt get is 'cos iMessage was not 'activated'. Check out

Settings > Messages

Once I fixed it wife was able to send iMessage to me.

Same problem here. I get the option for iMessage, sent the message , says it's delievered, the recipent gets no message. This is a huge problem which needs the immediate attention from Apple.

Having the same problem myself.

Apple again demonstrating their not-quite-there competence with the Cloud.

Here's a thought - (I'm also experiencing this problem). I have 2 Apple id's . Wish I didn't , but can't get around it. Perhaps the phone is logged into the wrong apple id?

doug