The distinction between acquisition and delivery also matters when a person's status changes. Someone may hear a report before embracing Islam and later transmit it after conversion, provided the report was genuinely retained.
Likewise, a person who heard while morally compromised may later repent and acquire the integrity required for narration. The condition at delivery is thus not automatically identical to the condition at hearing.
Fitness for delivery is assessed at the time of delivery.
This does not remove the need to verify that acquisition really occurred, the wording was preserved, and the narrator possesses the necessary integrity and precision when transmitting.