When transferring messaging services to Bandwidth, it’s important to remember that while messaging services may be enabled in the Bandwidth App, industry provisioning to Bandwidth may not be complete and might require manual intervention to be properly updated.
The specifics of this process vary, so please discuss your use case(s) with the Bandwidth Onboarding Team during the onboarding process and beyond to prepare for any possible scenarios and timelines you may encounter while transferring messaging services to Bandwidth.
This article highlights some of the key factors you should consider, along with some general information for the most common scenarios. If you have a unique scenario not covered below or still have questions, please open a ticket with the Bandwidth Messaging Support Team.
Transferring messaging services via porting
When porting numbers to Bandwidth, messaging services are expected, but not guaranteed, to transfer during the port. Some factors to consider during this process:
Local number porting: It’s standard for the messaging to port with the voice. However, if the end user currently has their messaging service set up with a third-party vendor, separate from their voice provider, messaging may have to be acquired separately.
Toll-free numbers: The end user’s messaging service may be provisioned with a third-party provider through a separate carrier from the voice service. In this case, transferring messaging will be a separate order from the port that moves voice service to Bandwidth.
Note: If you’re migrating full number inventories, it’s possible in some cases to coordinate the release of messaging to coincide with the port, though not guaranteed. In most cases, the messaging service will continue to work through the current provider even after the port completes, until messaging services are fully transferred to Bandwidth.
What happens to messaging when a number ports away from Bandwidth
When a number ports away to another provider, messaging will typically follow the voice service. This is because the new voice provider will often attempt to overwrite messaging as part of the porting process, assuming ownership of the messaging route(s). As a result, porting a number away can lead to a disruption in messaging if the new provider takes over messaging control. It is up to you and your end user to determine the appropriate steps if you wish to keep messaging with Bandwidth, but industry practice is that messaging follows the voice port unless specific actions are taken to prevent it.
Additionally, while there are some methods to try to keep messaging with the original provider (such as requesting a partial port or ensuring messaging is not enabled at the new provider), these approaches do not guarantee that messaging will remain unchanged, as the new voice provider has final authority over messaging hosting.
Transferring messaging services via Hosted Messaging
Hosted Messaging offers you the option to provision messaging services through Bandwidth while leaving the voice service in place with the current provider. Whether you’re provisioning 10DLC or toll-free numbers for hosted messaging, here are some important factors to take into account:
After adding a telephone number (TN) for Hosted Messaging in the Bandwidth App, we recommend creating a TN options subscription to receive order status updates to ensure that the TN has been updated successfully. You may also want to test the TN to ensure messaging works as intended.
If the TN test is unsuccessful, please open a ticket with the Bandwidth Messaging Support Team and include a Hosted Messaging LOA (signed within the last 30 days) so we may begin to investigate and remediate the issue.