[VoiceOps] VoIP SMS Campaign Fees

Tue Feb 15 23:23:31 EST 2022

Yep.

Their "Business SMS limitations and restrictions" is really just a
high-level copy of the CTIA Best Practices for P2P.

Anything outside of that is A2P, and it is clear that RingCentral is
offloading any required brand registration to their end users and directing
them to The Campaign Registry (TSC) for which, as the OP pointed out, $200
to get an account, and $10 per month per DID for a "campaign."

The goal here is to make sending business-related SMS as difficult and as
costly as possible because carriers spent too much time and money policing
bad actors who abused the openness of SMS.

You wanna send an SMS from outside the US Wireless Carrier Cabal (e.g.
T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T, US Mobile, US Cellular and the smaller wireless
carriers that own their own infrastructure)? You gotta pay.

This kills SMS forwarding. This kills the ability for a small business,
like a laudromat, sending "Your laundry is done" messages to their
customers via SMS, because now instead of being included in their plan,
because they are sending as a business, even only 50-100 per month, their
send/receive ratio is bad, and thus blocked by A2P CTIA Rules.

Now the laudromat must front $200 for the privilege PLUS spend $10/month
PLUS like $0.02 or more per SMS. 100 SMS messages costs them $12/month
ignoring the initial "brand registration" malarkey.

What the email says below, as I read it Brandon, is "hey we're including
SMS in your plan" and then adding "you're responsible for registering with
TSC but we aren't going to mention THOSE costs to you or what happens if
you don't register."

I hate it all. It feels smarmy, like a lazy way to put a money barrier up.

If registration with TCR was free, and the cost per month per DID was
related to your sending volume, I would feel better about it.

As it stands now, it's stupid, and hurts the small businesses and the big
businesses will keep doing whatever they want because it doesn't hurt them
at all, and the spammers/scammers will likely continue to do it and just
find holes in TCRs process or find carriers that aren't doing the right
thing and exploit them.

Beckman

On Tue, 15 Feb 2022, Brandon Svec via VoiceOps wrote:

> RingCentral started sending messages like this today.  I suppose others may
> follow?
>
>  Hello,
>
> We are writing to let you know about an upcoming change to SMS that’s
> affecting the entire industry. Recently, mobile carriers have begun
> treating all SMS from businesses large and small as commercial messaging.
> The mobile industry has added new registration requirements, and additional
> fees for sending and receiving SMS. They’ve also imposed new policies that
> we have summarized here
> <https://info.ringcentral.com/MDc1LURUQi03MTUAAAGCng7lt0vfsF5No4RhXgM826_pR9JaNgxfWelHAco-V1MrXVbXWVKPTvTyMrn4Tlk3poqlP30=>
> .
>
> We have been working with the carriers to address these changes, increase
> the deliverability of your SMS messages, and help protect you from
> potential carrier fines.
>
> To accomplish this, we have reinvisioned domestic SMS, and are excited to
> launch our RingCentral Enhanced Business SMS solution with new pricing and
> a number of monthly free SMS messages starting March 17, 2022.* *With our
> new pricing most customers, including yourself, are expected to be covered
> by these monthly allowances.*
>
> In January, your company used an estimated 1746 messages of the 8000
> included with your plan. Once this allowance is exhausted, you will be
> charged a transparent, flat rate of $0.0085 per SMS message sent or
> received, and $0.013 per MMS sent or received. For example, if you send 100
> SMS messages above your allowance, you would only pay 85¢.
>
> To help save your company more money, we also offer bulk prepaid SMS at a
> discounted rate if you need to send more.
>
> You can learn more about these changes and how allowances are calculated by
> scheduling a meeting with your sales representative, or reading more here
> <https://info.ringcentral.com/MDc1LURUQi03MTUAAAGCng7ltiq_e8c9C-iH9ro86naWms7maamahCdRf0TbZdf47Fu_9s1oXxqVweVEnWsObxMOII8=>
> .
>
>
> *Customers may also be required to register individual brand and/or
> campaign information with The Campaign Registry (the mobile carriers’
> preferred hub for managing SMS campaigns), which may result in additional
> fees.
> *Brandon Svec*
>
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 15, 2021 at 12:37 PM Nate Burke <nate at blastcomm.com> wrote:
>
>> Sorry if this was already discussed and I missed it.  I saw a notice on
>> our Voip Innovations account today that any business DID's that send SMS
>> messages to a consumer in any way now have to be registered with
>> 'Campaignregistry.com'  Looks like this requires a $200 signup, and then
>> potentially $10/month/DID.  Anyone already gone through this?  Talking
>> to VI, it seems they're not even sure, but it's a VI requirement to be
>> registered by Dec 15.
>>
>> The whole process seems confusing.  VI Makes it seem like non-compliance
>> will be expensive. $10,000/violation keeps being referenced.
>>
>> Would each one of my customers be considered a separate campaign at
>> $10/month?
>> _______________________________________________
>> VoiceOps mailing list
>> VoiceOps at voiceops.org
>> https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/voiceops
>>
>

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Peter Beckman                                                  Internet Guy
beckman at angryox.com                                https://www.angryox.com/
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