Systems and methods for delayed message delivery

A method comprising:

• receiving, at a message application server that is in communication with an Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem network and an Internet Protocol messaging gateway, a message from a first user equipment in response to a determination having been made that an account associated with the first user equipment has a delayed message delivery feature enabled, the message being addressed to a second user equipment, the message being formatted in accordance with a first protocol used by the Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem network, and the message comprising a time parameter provided by a user of the first user equipment;
• storing, at the message application server, the message in accordance with the time parameter;
• sending the message to the Internet Protocol messaging gateway in response to the time parameter being satisfied;
• receiving the message at the Internet Protocol messaging gateway from the message application server;
• converting the message from the first protocol to a second protocol used by a message center;
• and
• sending the message in the second protocol to the message center for delivery to the second user equipment.

A system comprising:

• a processor;
• and
• a computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform operations comprising:
• receiving a message from a first user equipment in response to a determination having been made that an account associated with the first user equipment has a delayed message delivery feature enabled, the message being addressed to a second user equipment, the message being formatted in accordance with a first protocol used by an Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem network, and the message comprising a time parameter entered by a user of the first user equipment,
• storing the message in accordance with the time parameter, and
• sending the message to an Internet Protocol messaging gateway in response to the time parameter being satisfied, wherein the Internet Protocol messaging gateway is configured to convert the message from the first protocol used by the Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem network to a second protocol used by a message center and to forward the message formatted in accordance with the second protocol to the message center.