Texting (SMS)

Status

The Best Deal On bot says that voice and email work today and texting is "a feature that turns on after a one-time carrier approval". It never offers texts (commit 56864d2; tenant extra_instructions).

Other lines (RF Safe) are out of scope for this wiki.

The gate (code)

• At creation, every tenant created through the API gets sms_enabled = false, "texting only after A2P approval" (src/app.js:177).
• setSms turns it on (src/app.js:270-283). It is called from the API (src/app.js:204) and from /admin/channels. Turning it on requires:
  • the tenant's first number to be E.164,
  • a messaging_service_sid matching MG+32 hex,
  • Twilio's Messaging Service sender pool to actually contain that number.
  • Otherwise it fails with a plain error (CH_ERR, src/app.js:283).
• If texting is off, the SMS tools return texting_not_yet_enabled (src/tools.js:135,222). The prompt says not to offer texts (src/xai.js:67,86-91). The readiness check flags it (src/readiness.js:33).
• Every customer text goes through sendCustomerSms. It checks consent first: the person must have contacted the business and must not have opted out (src/twilio.js:55-60). It sends through the Messaging Service when one is set. The STOP, START and HELP keywords are handled.

Diagram source (Mermaid)

flowchart TD
  A[Owner asks to turn texting on] --> B{"first number is +1 E.164?"}
  B -- no --> X1[409 no_number]
  B -- yes --> C{"messaging_service_sid is MG plus 32 hex?"}
  C -- no --> X2[400 invalid]
  C -- yes --> D[Read Twilio sender pool]
  D -- error --> X3[502 pool_check_failed]
  D --> E{number in pool?}
  E -- no --> X4[409 number_not_in_sender_pool]
  E -- yes --> F[sms_enabled=true, save]

Email fallback (until texting is approved)

• With email_enabled, the bot asks for the caller's email, reads it back to confirm, and emails the links through Resend (set_email_address/send_email, src/tools.js:53,181,213 [bdo]).
• The sender comes from brand.email_from (Best Deal On: support@bestdealon.app).
• Only allowlisted links are kept (src/email.js:20-26).
• Test guard: when PA_EMAIL_ALLOW_ONLY is set, a recipient must be on the list or be the address the caller confirmed on that call (src/email.js:10,63 [bdo]).

Planned

• Submit Best Deal On's A2P brand and campaign. Fees aren't paid yet. Waiting on John.
• Fix the site items 13–16 on the punch list before submitting.