It seems that the main advertised feature of the Messenger device - ability to seamlessly switch from Satellite to Internet - is not working as expected.
Just checked my second bill against my notes. The main problems are related to:
1. Someone sends you a message (either by replying in SMS thread or using theirs Messenger app). If your Messenger app is open and your iphone is connected to a reliable wifi/LTE, then in more than 50% of the cases it will be correctly delivered over Internet and invisible in your bill. But in some cases it is obviously immediately delivered over internet (my Messenger device does not even have any view of the sky), but is still charged as delivered over Satellite in the bill.
2. You can't be sure which way this message was delivered to you until you receive your bill. Initially, in the app it seems to be delivered over Internet, but when I double check it after the billing period restarts and then it reads as delivered over Satellite.
3. You can't trust the message counters. There are three: in the Explore homepage, in the Messenger App and you can check it in Messenger Device itself. All three are presenting different numbers so you never know if you're over your allowance limit until the bill arrives.
The combination of the above problems stops me from using Messenger as the only messaging app while on a hike: I know I will be charged for some of the incoming messages even if I have a perfect LTE connection.
My far shot is the server-side code does not re-attempt to re-deliver the message over internet if the initial push notification wasn't successful - it immediately falls back to Iridium even if the internet message would be delivered 2 seconds later. I guess a simple re-try up to 3 times with 15s waiting period will fix it..
Anyone knows any temporary solution to this problem? How do you deal with this unreliability of transport layer selection?
Regards
Jan
