SMS Text Messaging System

[lovelldr]

Hi All...

 

I've been asked by the school to look in to getting quotes for a SMS System. The head has specified that she wants an unlimited system. We are fairly average sized primary (about 420 children), and have been using a trial of a company for a month now. Another company don't do trials, but they have said they do an unlimited system, but the way the system works is on a fair use policy, and if after the first year, we are using more than their fair use, the unlimited cost is increased for the second year... They informed me that the fair use policy was around 28,000 messages.

 

With the trial I've had, in the last month, we sent 2000 sms. And that was with quite a few all school messages, that tbh weren't worthy of a sms message, and would've been better just going on to the website, or twitter feeds... So, I think we'd be perfectly fine just having a bundle system. However, the head wants to go ahead with an unlimited system, because she's worried that people won't want to use it if we told them that there was a limit to sms...

 

However, my argument is, that if we used the sms for every single thing, then parents are soon going to start getting fed up with receiving the messages. My thought on using the SMS system, is that it should only be used to query where children are if they aren't in school on a day, inform parents that they owe dinner money, inform of trips that are happening/late returns from trips, cancelled clubs, etc, etc... Asking the office staff, we would probably be sending around 30-50 messages a day at most, for these type of messages, then on the odd occasion of whole school messages or year group trips etc, inform them through the other means...

 

How have other schools got on with SMS? How many roughly are you sending in a year (and how big is your school)? Are parents getting fed up of receiving SMS?

 

If anyone has gone on an unlimited option, is it truely unlimited? I've heard stories that companies offering truley unlimited options, put the prices up the following year if the number of messages in the previous year was over a certain amount... Anyone had experience of that?

 

All responses gratefully received.

 

Cheers,

 

David

[vikpaw]

Who have you tried? What MIS are you using?

Worth getting in touch with @Schoolcomms they have great service, but are dedicated to SIMS.

Groupcall is the other one to consider.

 

Both will do trials.

 

I've never been a fan of unlimited, but if you choose to send a lot, then it makes sense. Like you, I think sending everything by SMS devalues it, and then when there's an emergency, they might not respond or act.

I think all unlimited options are going to be subject to a fair usage policy, unless the costs are mammoth. This shouldn't be unreasonable and they generally act in good faith giving high limits.

 

For my Saudi secondary, we just went with using them for emergencies, so kept a bank of them in stock, enough to message every contact twice.

 

Another option to consider is that some systems will be able to send a push message which can save you an SMS, and would also appear differently, so the true SMS retains it's value.

 

Once you find the right company, look into what other features they offer, such as emails, reports, apps, payments etc. It's worth evaluating the whole package and at least let it partly factor into the equation.

[PhilNeal]

We have parents at Capita that are being bombarded by text messages from schools - especially those with multiple children. Messages really need to be targeted.

[Banjo]

If you use SIMS then Schoolcomms works very well Schoolcomms | Functionality and Features of the system better than intouch

[Schoolcomms]

Hi David,

 

There are several SMS options that you could turn to but we’ll discuss the advantages of the one that we know best – our own.

 

Schoolcomms offers unlimited texts with our Unlimited Messaging but our upper limit is on a case by case basis. If you would like a specific quote then please feel free to call us on 0333 332 7147. Alternatively, our free School Gateway parent app offers free push notifications on our Premium messaging option. This would allow you to communicate directly to parents’ phones for free whilst preserving the impact of a SMS text.

 

Schoolcomms functionality also allows you to contact certain parents – those with absent children, attendees of certain clubs or year groups etc. – allowing you to decide precisely who you want to contact and even how to contact them (SMS, email or via the app). It’s also integrated with SIMS and will therefore easily write back to SIMS and text parents whose children have been marked as absent.

 

We’re going a little off topic now but it may still be relevant to you and your school – we’re just about to release a Primary Bundle that includes SMS messaging and a huge amount of further functionality, such as showing parents their dinner money balance, notifiying parents of achievements and enabling parents to book and pay for clubs within the School Gateway app. This may not be for you but if you’re hoping to increase your functionality in the future it’s worth keeping it in mind.

 

Let us know if you would like any further information! We’d be happy to talk on the phone (call us on 0333 332 7147) or you can drop us an email at [email protected].

Edited May 2, 2017 by Schoolcomms

[ellsandell]

We have parents at Capita that are being bombarded by text messages from schools - especially those with multiple children. Messages really need to be targeted.

 

I agree with this - like any comms system, messages need to be targeted and not used too frequently or they loose their effectiveness. People/parents will just ignore them like they ignore emails.