Presented herein are efficient techniques through which a session management function (SMF) may obtain, from a user plane function (UPF), an error indication associated with a user equipment (UE) for which a handover has been initiated from a Fourth Generation (4G) network to a Fifth Generation (5G) network. The SMF function initiates a timer in response to receiving the error indication. The SMF function stops the timer and processes a request when the request is obtained before an expiration of the timer and processes the error indication when the request is not received before the expiration of the timer.