A toll-free number looks like any other number until it tries to send a text. Then the carriers ask who is behind it, and until somebody answers, the messages are filtered or dropped — usually with nothing in Echo to say so.
Toll-free verification is that answer. This screen is where you file it and watch it move.
Where to find it
In the admin menu, click Phone Numbers, then Toll-Free along the top.
Echo's own words on this screen: toll-free verification is separate from branding — a toll-free number does not need an A2P brand or campaign. If all your numbers are toll-free, you are on this screen and not on Branding.
Filing a verification
- Find the number in the list. The search box matches on number or name.
- Start its verification.
- Fill in who your organization is and how the number will be used. If recipients know you by a trade name that differs from your legal name, enter it in Doing Business As. It is optional, and leaving it blank does not clear a name the carrier already has on file. Click SAVE.
- Open the number again from the list and click SUBMIT TO TWILIO at the bottom of the form. The button appears once every required field is filled in and saved.
Echo saves your answers as a draft, so you can leave the form and come back to it. Coming back to the same number reopens the draft rather than starting a second one. Once a verification is pending or approved the button is gone; any edits you save are sent the next time it is submitted.
What the statuses mean
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Not Verified | Nothing has been filed for this number yet. Texts from it are at risk. |
| Draft | Started and saved in Echo, not yet sent to the carriers. |
| Ready to Submit | Every required field is filled in and saved, but it has not been sent to the carriers yet. |
| Pending Review / In Review | Filed. The carriers are looking at it. This takes days, not minutes. |
| Verified | Done. The number can send. |
| Rejected | Turned down, with a reason. Correct it and file again. |
Refresh Status, in a number's expanded row, asks the carrier for the latest status on one number. The list itself renders from what Echo already knows, which is why it loads at the same speed whether the carrier is fast, slow or down — and why a status can be a little behind until you refresh it.
What the terms mean
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Toll-free number | A number a caller is not charged for — in North America, one starting 800, 833, 844, 855, 866, 877 or 888. |
| Verification | The filing that tells the carriers who owns a toll-free number and what it sends. |
| A2P | Application-to-person — texts sent by a system rather than typed by a person on a handset. Everything Echo sends is A2P. |
| Branding | The separate registration that ordinary (non toll-free) US numbers need. See the A2P Brand Registration article. |
Start it early
Approval is out of Echo's hands and out of yours. If a campaign depends on a toll-free number, file the verification weeks before the campaign, not the week of it.