Sorry to inform you, but there is really no such thing as free or unlimeted text messaging. Text messages are sent via the SMS protocol and there is always an expense incurred by someone when one is sent. Companies or services offering free or unlimited text messaging are either going to be unreliable, particularly when you need them most, because they send them an alternate way, or they are simply hiding the cost elsewhere. Let’s address that first part. When a company is offering you free or unlimited text messaging, they often have used an unreliable technique which is sometimes referred to as SMTP text messaging.
What is SMTP text messaging? Companies who send SMTP text messages do not actually send a real SMS text message. Instead they send an email with the message text to the cell provider, which the provider then forwards to the phone as a real SMS text message. SMTP text messages will fail. SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is the system emails are sent over, so SMTP text messaging is just a fancy way of saying, “We email them to the cell provider and cross our fingers.”
Many people are unaware, but all major cellular carriers have this “email us and we’ll forward as a text message” service. Any one can use it. For example, if you had a phone number 973-555-1212, and your service provider was Verizon, then sending an email to 9735551212@vztext.com will prompt Verizon to forward the message to that person’s cell phone as an SMS text message. Go ahead try it… here is a list of the domains to send to for the major US carriers. Substitute in your phone number and send an email with a short message and you are going to see it hit your phone as an SMS text message. (If you don’t, then you’ve just discovered the lack of reliability of this method)
- Alltel – 10-digit phone number@message.alltel.com
- AT&T – 10-digit phone number@txt.att.net
- Sprint – 10-digit phone number@messaging.sprintpcs.com
- T-Mobile – 10-digit phone number@tmomail.net
- Verizon – 10-digit phone number@vtext.com
This method is a great solution for the company offering you free text messages. That is as long as they don’t mind failing their customers here and there. To send the messages, all they have to do is dispatch an email, which costs nothing, and the text message gets delivered. The average user doesn’t know what is going on behind the scenes, so they assume the company sent the text message directly.
So where’s the problem? This technique works most of the time, particularly when the emails are sent one at a time or in very small batches (like when the company needs to demo there text message functionality). The cell service provider forwards these emails through their SMS system as a free service and it is intended to be used by casual users, not companies selling text message services. The cell provider offers no guarantee that they will deliver the messages. When you send a large volume of these emails simultaneously, the provider will typically dump the whole batch or only deliver a few before dumping the rest. Also, when cell providers get these requests, they place them in a queue and send them out when there is enough resources available. So even the text messages that do get through do so after an unpredictable delay.
When do you need your text messages to go through the most? That’s right… in a widespread emergency. And when do you suppose the cell provider’s queue’s will be backlogged and more likely to dump out unexpected large batches of messages? You got it… in a widespread emergency. The only way to ensure that the company you choose to send text messages is going to reliable deliver them is to ensure that they send them directly via SMS.
Universal Alert guarantees that every text message triggered by our emergency notification system is sent out via SMS. We send our text messages out through the largest and most reliable SMS gateway system in the world. We pay every time a message is sent over our system.
The best part? You can send unlimited and free text messages with Universal Alert. All you have to do is enter the recipients phone address with the proper domain as an email address. Emails are unlimited with our system, so email the cell providers with your messages all you want. Most of the time they will send them through for you. We just don’t trick you and claim that these emails to a cell provider constitute real text messaging.
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Want to ensure your emergency alert system is looking at the big picture and not trying to cut costs? Visit www.universalalert.com for more information, including demos and pricing.