Q. How may I be sure that my SMS have been successfully transmitted?

The SMS you send are transmitted in reception acknowledgement mode. You will be informed of the precise reception date/time of the SMS on the recipient mobile phone after successful transmission, or in case of error of the precise error cause (e.g. mobile offline or unreachable, SMS will be retransmitted later). Those informations are transmitted back to our SMS gateway from the recipient mobile network operator, on some networks those acknowledgements may not be processed.

The SMS delivery status may be displayed using all MCTEL SMS sending software tools: VideoSMS/PC Desktop PC sender software, www.smsfax.com Web SMS form, all APIs.

Q. Must I pay the SMS software and SMS sending?

All the client software, tools and API are put to your disposal free of charge, along with free test SMS units. Once those free test units are spent, the only fee you have to pay is a small amount for each SMS sent. Each SMS is charged for a given number of SMS units, depending on the recipient country (from 3 to 10 units). Units could be purchased on this Web, at a degressive rate according to the number of units purchased at the same time (please refer to the rates page).

Q. Are the SMS transmitted immediately?

SMS are transmitted immediately to the recipient mobile operator. The route to this operator may pass by other operators using the roaming facility, the transmission time is usually very short in a matter of a few seconds. The recipient mobile operator will then be responsible for the SMS transmission to the intended recipient, this delivery may be delayed if for example the mobile is offline or outside network coverage.

You could ask for delayed SMS delivery by specifying its transmission date/time, for example to send birthday wishes.

Q. The recipient has not received the SMS I sent. It that normal?

SMS may not be transmitted immediately in various cases:

• Recipient mobile is offline or outside network coverage.
• Recipient is travelling abroad and has not subscribed to the international roaming option to be able to send and receive calls from abroad.
• The SIM card capacity for SMS storage of the recipient mobile is fully used (on some phones, the SMS are stored on the SIM card that has a limited capacity. When the SIM card capacity for SMS storage is full, no further standard SMS may be received from any sender, the flash messages may be received).
• An error occured on the mobile network operator SMS-Center (exceptional).

In those cases you will get an error message and explanation.

Useful trick: try the send the message in "flash" mode to the recipient if you think his/her SIM card may be full: even in this case a flash message will be immediately displayed on the mobile screen

Q. May I send any kind of message?

You must follow as specified in our software licence and service usage agreement all the laws and regulations applicable to electronic communication and SMS transmission. For example it is unlawful to send insulting, racist, illegal messages. Most countries and network mobile operators prohibit the sending of unsolicited advertising messages by SMS (spam), except to recipients having previously accepted to receive such messages (recipients said "opt-in", an easy way must be given to those recipients to "opt-out" the distribution list).

Accounts violating those rules and applicable laws will be terminated immediately without prejudice, the sender remaining lawfully responsible for all messages sent.

Q. Why must I give my name, email address and mobile number when opening my account?

As subscriber and as explained above, you are responsible for the content of the SMS you send, as for any other communication media (snail mail, email, phone...). Your password giving access to the service will be transmitted to you by SMS on your mobile phone to authenticate your call.