Navigating the Challenges of A2P 10DLC Registration (And How KONTXT for Messaging Can Help!)
Starting June 1, 2023, T-Mobile (including MetroPCS and Sprint) and AT&T will increase unregistered A2P 10-digit long code (10DLC) pass-through fees. This means that businesses that are not registered (or unaware of the requirements) for 10DLC messaging will incur higher costs for sending A2P SMS and MMS messages. Registered 10DLC messaging costs will not change.
Why are the fees increasing?
The carriers are doing their part to encourage 10DLC registration with The Campaign Registry (TCR) to protect end users from spam, fraud, and poor A2P SMS and MMS experiences on behalf of their subscriber bases.
As many aggregators and content service providers have discovered over the past 4 years of the 10DLC rollout, registering for 10DLC messaging can be challenging. One of the main obstacles to registering traffic is identifying the brands and owners of 10DLC numbers, many of which could have been sending messages to their customers for years. Additionally, not all messaging platforms required provisioning of the actual numbers in the system to send messages, which means even the knowing which numbers are being used by a given account can be a challenge. To complicate this even further, there is no central directory for long code numbers in the United States to help.
This is where KONTXT for Messaging comes in. KONTXT for Messaging is a platform that offers advanced analytics and machine learning capabilities to help identify unregistered messaging traffic, categorize the traffic into clusters and use cases, and can help speed up registration process for carrier relations, compliance, and account management teams. With KONTXT, users can get an indication of what brands and/or owners of 10DLC numbers might be, which simplifies the effort to get the word out to their customers in order to avoid the additional costs.
Businesses that use A2P 10DLC messaging, even if it was setup in the mid-2000’s, should be aware of the upcoming fee increases and take action to avoid them. Additionally, if you are managing a lot of messaging customers and still struggling to get visibility and direction into what your traffic looks like, consider reaching out to our team and learning how KONTXT for Messaging to jump start your team’s 10DLC registration process.
