Guide to the Toll-Free Number (TFN) Verification Process

• Promotes consumer trust and ensures SMS stays a long-term trusted marketing channel. By enforcing stricter verification processes and filtering potential spam, carriers will ultimately earn the trust of consumers by protecting their most intimate inbox from spam and fraud schemes and only allowing authorized traffic to enter (aka messages from their friends, family, and favorite brands!).
• Reduces the chance of being filtered by carriers. iOS16 makes it easier for consumers to report spam/junk. Verifying your number before sending can reduce the chance of being flagged as spam and filtered by carriers.
• Focus on running your business and setting up your SMS program compliantly while Postscript does the heavy lifting for you. In the event your verification is denied, our team will work closely with you and our carrier partners to help you through the escalation process quickly.

Before we dive into the TFN verification process, let’s define a TFN. A toll-free number (TFN) is a 10-digit number starting with (8XX) that a shop can use to send SMS and MMS messages to a subscriber's mobile device. You've likely seen a toll-free number in a texting campaign, such as "Text HOLIDAYS to 1-833-555-1234."

Postscript assigns a toll-free number to your shop as soon as you install Postscript. You can view your shop's toll-free number on your Keywords page.

Postscript uses both toll-free numbers and dedicated short codes (DSC). TFNs are great for businesses new to SMS as they provide brands with a professional phone number to send messages. DSCs are ideal for shops with a large subscriber list who want fast, consistent delivery speeds. Learn more about the differences between a TFN and DSC here.

Once a TFN is assigned to a shop (upon installation), it’s sent through the verification process. Postscript first manually reviews the shop’s website. This manual review can take up to 5 business days. Shops will be audited for legitimacy (in other words, we are looking to make shops are running real ecommerce businesses and not attempting to scam or smish consumers via SMS).

Because carriers have additional restrictions for certain types of brands (often referred to as SHAFT brands - learn more here), part of this process involves checking your site for any SHAFT content. SHAFT stands for sex, hate, alcohol, firearms, and tobacco (CBD--included).

Carriers aim to protect consumers - especially underage consumers - from being exposed to SHAFT products and marketing. As a result, carriers will block/filter messages that include SHAFT content without proper age verification on the website and in the SMS thread.

As a carrier-trusted provider, Postscript offers in-thread age verification and is able to service US alcohol brands on the professional and enterprise plans starting in January 2023. If you are a brand that sells alcohol-related products, please see this article to understand how your brand can begin messaging the appropriate subscribers compliantly.

Once your website is audited by the Postscript platform, our partner Twilio provides a human audit on behalf of the U.S. and Canadian carriers. The entire verification process can take ~3-10 business days.

There are several reasons (and many that we can overcome via escalation) however, the most common reasons are:

• Impermissible Website Content. Because carriers have additional restrictions for certain types of brands (often referred to as SHAFT brands - learn more here), part of this process involves checking your site for any SHAFT content. SHAFT stands for sex, hate, alcohol, firearms, and tobacco (CBD--included). Because there are limited age-verification abilities for receiving SMS, carriers aim to protect consumers - especially underage consumers - from being exposed to SHAFT products and marketing. As a result, carriers will block/filter messages that include SHAFT content. At this time, Postscript cannot support brands who sell merchandise that falls in any SHAFT category
• Website Not Live or Password Protected. A TFN verification may be denied if your shop’s website is not yet live or password protected and therefore cannot be reviewed by the audit teams. You can expect your TFN status to remain denied until your site is live and can be fully audited. If you downloaded Postscript and were assigned a TFN before your site was live, be sure to reach out to verifications@postscript.io to notify them when your site is live so they can resubmit your TFN for verification.

If after 10 business days, your shop is experiencing filtering (issues sending more than 2,000 messages per day) please reach out to verifications@postscript.io or chat with Support.

In the event your TFN verification is denied in error, our team will work closely with you and the verification team to correct your verification status so you can begin sending promptly.

Sending to US recipients: Sending to a large list of US recipients from an unverified TFN could make your brand subject to filtering or blocking all messages at a certain message volume threshold by US carriers. This current threshold is 2,000 messages per day. Note: this threshold is subject to change as US carriers move towards stricter verification requirements and lower sending thresholds.

Sending to CA recipients: All messages sent from an unverified TFN to Canadian recipients will be blocked by Canadian carriers until the aforementioned TFN is verified. It should be noted that your brand will not be charged for failed sends to Canada due to sending from an unverified number.