Why are my texting conversations separated into two conversations?

[Tricia Hatfield]

I have a Sony Xperia Z3 Compact. When I send a text message (This only happens with a handful of my contacts), the conversations get split into 2 messages. One is their side of the conversation, which comes in all in the same message, and the second is all my responses. This is very annoying as I have to continually flip from one message back to the other while texting. Is there a way to merge them together? I called Sony Support, and they have no idea!! I know there has to be a way to fix this as its not happening with all of my contacts, just a select few! HELP!!!

This is what it looks like on my phone (Without posting a pic)

Hubby
Me: Testing Settings...grrr (This is ALL my side of the convo)

Hubby
did u call support? (This is ALL his side of the convo)

My Bestie
Thats great! (This contact is working properly...her response & mine together)

 

[Rukbat]

If it's happening with only a few contacts, it's probably the way they have their texting apps set up. (Does it happen on short texts like the examples, or only on texts longer than 160 characters?)

For texts longer than 60 characters, the app can send multiple 160 character texts, and the receiving app stitches them together, or the sending app can put the entire message into a text file and send it as an MMS (basically texting you a link to the text file). Different apps handle the two methods either the same or differently (depending on the app).

Texting wasn't designed for long messages - it's the pocket pager protocol, where a message usually consisted of a short text (like "call me" or "I'm here" or a phone number. It's been stretched to cover longer texts (over 160 characters), but not every app does it the same way, so ... problems. You could try installing a few different texting apps (GO SMS Pro, Textra SMS, etc.) and see if any of them handle things the way you prefer. As long as they're SMS, they'll work with anyone else's phone (even iPhones - once the iPhone user sets their iMessage app to use SMS when texting you).

 

[neueones]

Hi!
I have the same issue and also XPERIA Z3 compact.
Only one contact conversation out of tens is being separated.

What is also interesting - when I use SMS backup & restore they are all merged and the conversation thread is in correct order (in backup file and its preview only) .

Any ideas?

Very best!

 

[DJCBS]

Texting wasn't designed for long messages

Well, the problem is that they've reduced the number of characters on sms's year after year. 10 years ago, you could send a over 200 character sms. And 15 years ago, during the reign of the Nokia 3310, you could send sms's so long that you could create drawings with the letters and numbers that would move when you pressed the "down" arrow.

It's very frustrating to me too the 160 characters limit. As as my mother language has special letters (á, à, ã etc) I always get the reduced size. Which is why WhatsApp has basically replaced my sms's hub.

 

[Spirk]

Is there a 1 before their area code in their contact profile? Example: 1-123-555-1234

If there is a 1 at the beginning then remove it. Also tell the other person to remove the 1 in front of your number on their side as well. I had this problem on an S4 and this turned out to be the fix. Also, make sure you only have one entry for that person in your contacts. Let us know what happens.

 

[neueones]

No, it's an European country code +4..... but also a foreign contact. I changed + to 00 and restored all messages from a backup (after having cleaned my inbox first). After that all threads look fine.
Thanks for all help,

 

[isabellamaxine]

been having this problem too -- except for some reason it's only happening with conversations with my family...

I have a 1 in front of all of my contacts' numbers. There's no difference in the way they're saved, so I'm not sure if that's the issue here... Please help!

 

[Dianne Currie]

Just signed up to respond to this because I went crazy trying to fix this issue. Delete the brackets around your area code. I was only getting the the issue from contacts with brackets in the phone number... Hope this works for you too!

 

[rob damiani]

same exact issue on my One Plus Two. The only texting app that I've ever had installed on this is ChompSMS. Very annoying.

 

[Nalorin]

Just signed up to respond to this because I went crazy trying to fix this issue. Delete the brackets around your area code. I was only getting the the issue from contacts with brackets in the phone number... Hope this works for you too!

Looks like this worked for me! Thanks so much!

 

[TW2002]

I have a sony xperia Z5 Premium and I'm having this problem with 2 contacts, no backets, no area codes, the only thing in common is that they are using older version iphones. The split is happening in my default sms app and now that I'm using FB messenger as my SMS app. It's really frustrating. Has anyone else got any ideas?

Thanks
TW

 

[EuphoricFuzion]

Which backup app did you use?
Thank you!