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Whatsapp woes

My wife recently had to send her Samsung A41 in for repair (don't ask!!) so she reverted back to her earlier J5. This all worked, no problem, but after putting the SIM back into the repaired A41 she's hit a problem with Whatsapp verification. It keeps reporting that it isn't able to send the SMS verification code, even though it's showing the correct phone number. It says to wait for 59 minutes but this just keeps repeating ad infinitum. This procedure worked when she first went back to the J5 but now doesn't. The SMS is working okay, we've exchanged messages.

In desperation we've tried uninstalling Whatsapp and downloading and installing a new copy from Play Store. This accepted the telephone number but then came up with the same error. To make matters worse there is now no Whatsapp icon on the desktop. It is installed since it appears in the list of Apps in Settings and there's a button to open it from there but when she does this it still comes up with the same error. In the verification box the buttons for resending the code and requesting a phone contact from Whatsapp are greyed out.

From searches she's done online it appears that this is a fairly common problem but so far we've not found any ways to resolve it. If anyone here has experienenced this problem and found a solution we'd be very grateful to know about it.
 
My wife recently had to send her Samsung A41 in for repair (don't ask!!) so she reverted back to her earlier J5. This all worked, no problem, but after putting the SIM back into the repaired A41 she's hit a problem with Whatsapp verification. It keeps reporting that it isn't able to send the SMS verification code, even though it's showing the correct phone number. It says to wait for 59 minutes but this just keeps repeating ad infinitum. This procedure worked when she first went back to the J5 but now doesn't. The SMS is working okay, we've exchanged messages.

In desperation we've tried uninstalling Whatsapp and downloading and installing a new copy from Play Store. This accepted the telephone number but then came up with the same error. To make matters worse there is now no Whatsapp icon on the desktop. It is installed since it appears in the list of Apps in Settings and there's a button to open it from there but when she does this it still comes up with the same error. In the verification box the buttons for resending the code and requesting a phone contact from Whatsapp are greyed out.

From searches she's done online it appears that this is a fairly common problem but so far we've not found any ways to resolve it. If anyone here has experienenced this problem and found a solution we'd be very grateful to know about it.
desktop? do you mean home screen? does the app appear in your app drawer? if so, you can then just add the app to your home screen.

as far as your main issue and after researching(google'ing), i have not come accross your exact issue. most of the troubleshooting mentions checking that the phone number and country code are correct. also i have found one or two instances that mentions that even if the option is greyed out, it still might be able to resend your verification code.

.....so....beyond that i also would recommend that you try and contact Whatsapp:
 
Yes, I do mean home screen and no it isn't in the app drawer. As I said it can only be found in Apps within Settings. We did try clicking on the greyed-out boxes but, predictably, it didn't do anything. We'll try contacting Whatsapp as you suggest. Thanks for the link.
 
Yes, I do mean home screen and no it isn't in the app drawer. As I said it can only be found in Apps within Settings. We did try clicking on the greyed-out boxes but, predictably, it didn't do anything. We'll try contacting Whatsapp as you suggest. Thanks for the link.
i would try and uninstall the app and try again. it should be in your app drawer if it is downloaded and installed.
 
I did get it from Play Store. I was referring to the mechanism to verify by inputting a code sent by SMS, which had failed because a window popped up saying the SMS could not be sent, wait 1 hour then try again. This sequence just kept repeating.

We have actually got it sorted now. I uninstalled, and after the install I realised Whatsapp still appeared in the list of apps in Settings so I uninstalled again and this time it said something about a shell. After this it did vanish from the list. I then turned the phone off and re-started it, which I hadn't done previously.

After re-installing from Play Store I ran it and filled in the phone number after which it offered two options for verification. One appeared to be to allow Whatsapp to make a missed phone call and check the phone log to see if it was successful. The other was to use a code supplied via SMS. I chose the SMS method and this ended up in exactly the same impasse as previously, back in a loop from which I couldn't escape, so I uninstalled and reinstalled for a third time, chose the other option and this time it worked!!

Incidentally it turned out the icon was in the Apps Drawer - it was on the third page. It hadn't occurred to me there was more than one, even though the three dots were clearly visible at the bottom of the page. I feel a complete fool now Doh!!
 
I did get it from Play Store. I was referring to the mechanism to verify by inputting a code sent by SMS, which had failed because a window popped up saying the SMS could not be sent, wait 1 hour then try again. This sequence just kept repeating.

We have actually got it sorted now. I uninstalled, and after the install I realised Whatsapp still appeared in the list of apps in Settings so I uninstalled again and this time it said something about a shell. After this it did vanish from the list. I then turned the phone off and re-started it, which I hadn't done previously.

After re-installing from Play Store I ran it and filled in the phone number after which it offered two options for verification. One appeared to be to allow Whatsapp to make a missed phone call and check the phone log to see if it was successful. The other was to use a code supplied via SMS. I chose the SMS method and this ended up in exactly the same impasse as previously, back in a loop from which I couldn't escape, so I uninstalled and reinstalled for a third time, chose the other option and this time it worked!!

Incidentally it turned out the icon was in the Apps Drawer - it was on the third page. It hadn't occurred to me there was more than one, even though the three dots were clearly visible at the bottom of the page. I feel a complete fool now Doh!!
ok, i'm glad you got it worked out finally. thanx for posting your solution. yeah rebooting should always be apart of any troubleshooting on an android phone. i completely forgot to mention that step.
 
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