One very nice feature the iPhone lacks is the ability to request a delivery report on text messages. I usually abuse these by sending a text message to family/friends while they’re on a plane. As soon as they land and switch on their phone, I get a delivery report. Which essentially tells me “for free” that the person has landed. (With Belgian carriers, receiving text messages is always free, even abroad, because you can’t refuse them).

Obviously, someone figured out a way to do it anyway by prefixing a few extra chacacters to the text message. The exact text depends on your carrier, the link lists a bunch. I personally have tested it with Proximus (the Belgacom cellular carrier) and the “*R*” prefix (without quotes) works. This is the message I got back (I did obfuscate some numbers to protect my privacy):

id:0_______75 sub:001 dlvrd:001 submit date:1_______54 done date:1_______11 stat:DELIVRD err:000 text:BeginningOfTextMessa