Coverage & delivery
What happens to your SMS when you send to a country that requires sender registration and yours isn't approved yet: what arrives, under which sender, and what you are charged.
Every country decides which senders it accepts an SMS from. In some, creating your sender is enough; in others it has to be registered first. This page covers what happens when you send to a country that requires it and yours isn't approved yet — because it isn't what most people expect: the message goes out anyway.
What registration gets you
In countries that ask for it, registering your sender is what lets us file it with the operator. In most cases the operator clears your own sender and your messages arrive under your brand; in some countries it assigns a different alias, or a number where text names aren't accepted.
We handle that filing from the register you create in the panel. All you need to do is create the sender and request the countries. The full process is in Senders & registration.
What happens if you don't have it
Without a register we still send, and it is still billed. What changes is the guarantee: delivery becomes best-effort, and from there the country's operator decides — it may change your sender or filter the message.
This explains two situations that often cause confusion:
- "My customer says it came from a strange number." That can happen: your sender wasn't approved in that country and the operator replaced it. Your reports and exports still show your sender, because that's what you sent; what changed is what the recipient saw.
- "It never arrived and you charged me." That can happen too. The message was handed to the operator — which is why it's billed — and the operator dropped it.
Where registration is required
There is no single list that answers this, and be wary of anyone who gives you one: requirements vary by country, by operator and by the kind of sender you use.
The answer for your own case is in the panel. Open your sender under Settings → Project → Channels → SMS and you'll see, country by country, which are approved and which need registration. Use Request country to add one.
The regulatory specifics of each destination — which body is involved, what paperwork it asks for and how long it takes — are in Countries.
Links have rules too
In some destinations operators restrict links inside an SMS: they may require the domain to be registered beforehand, filter the message carrying it, or strip the link out. This is separate from the sender restriction: you can have an approved sender and still have your links limited.
If your campaigns carry links and you send outside your usual market, check with us before a large send. Using your own branded domain helps, because a known, stable domain draws less suspicion than a generic shortener.
RCS works the other way round
Don't carry the above over to the other channel — the rule is the opposite:
- On SMS, without a register the message still goes out and delivery is best-effort.
- On RCS, without an approved register nothing is sent to that country, no exceptions. Your contacts only receive something if you have SMS fallback enabled, and then they receive it as an SMS.
The RCS detail is in Senders & verification and Availability.