Business texting approval

Texting sends from your business number — the same number your assistant answers. Before it can text customers, US carriers require a one-time registration of your business (called A2P 10DLC). It's an anti-spam rule set by the carriers, not by us, and every provider has to follow it.

Calls never wait on this. Your assistant answers, books, and escalates from the day you go live. Until texting clears, confirmations and reminders go by email. The moment it clears, texting switches on by itself and we tell you.

When to do it

Whenever you like. Turn on texting, in Settings → Phone & texting, takes about five minutes to fill in — Home's setup list links straight to it. After you submit, the carriers review it — typically 1–3 weeks end to end, sometimes longer; busy periods and resubmissions stretch that. We submit it and chase it; we can't approve it, expedite it, or promise a date.

You'll need an EIN

Carriers register texting to a tax-verified business. If you don't have an EIN (federal tax ID), it's free and takes about ten minutes at irs.gov — sole proprietors can get one without changing how they file taxes.

What we handle for you

Almost everything the carriers actually review is generated by Conduit so it's consistent and compliant by construction: the campaign description, the opt-in explanation (how customers consent to your texts — by asking your assistant for a text on a call), sample messages, the STOP/HELP/START keyword replies, and your business's own hosted policy pages at a public address. Before anything is submitted, we verify that your live assistant really speaks the texting consent our registration describes and that every page we reference loads.

Carrier registration is included in your plan — there's no separate setup fee. The carriers' one-time registration and vetting fees, and the monthly campaign fee while texting is on, are paid by Conduit out of your plan price — we pay them when we file, and they're never billed to you separately. Standard message and data rates on your customers' own phone plans are between them and their carrier.

The few things that are yours

Carriers cross-check everything against your facts, so these are worth a careful minute:

• Legal business name — must match your IRS/EIN paperwork exactly. If customers know you by a different name, that's fine (it's a DBA) — we declare the relationship for you, but your website should show both names somewhere.
• Website (optional) — if you give one, reviewers open it. It must load over https, name your business, and not sit behind a login. No website? Leave it blank and we submit your hosted messaging page instead.
• Contact email — an address on your business's own domain reviews best. A gmail or yahoo address can work if that exact address appears somewhere public tied to your business.
• Your industry — carriers prohibit texting entirely for a few content categories (tobacco/vape, cannabis/CBD, firearms, gambling, loan marketing, and similar). No wording gets around that; calls still work fully.

After you submit

Nothing else to do. Each stage shows in Settings → Phone & texting, and we tell you the moment it's approved.

If it comes back rejected

Rejections are normal and almost always fixable. The carriers give a reason code; we translate it into plain English in your inbox. Most causes are in the parts we generate, and we correct and resubmit those ourselves — you'll just see the status change. The few that land on you are named exactly: your legal name not matching IRS records, your website not naming the business or needing a login, or a contact email reviewers couldn't tie to you. Fix the named thing and resubmit in one tap. The full playbook is in if your texting registration is rejected.