SMS marketers are facing unprecedented penalties proposed by T-Mobile that may rock the 10DLC messaging industry. T-Mobile is requiring new 10DLC to be approved prior to launching SMS campaigns and violations can be very costly. T-Mobile made an announcement to block non-registered numbers for 10DLC, its surcharges, other fees, and penalties for violations. The blocking of non-registered numbers will start on June 01, 2021.

Here are the details on new fees and penalties:

Current and proposed surcharges for 10DLC/long codes

• VZ – $0.00255, since February 2020
• AT&T – $0.002, till May 1, after that based on reputation $0.002 ~ $0.004
• T-Mobile – $0.003 for MT and MO, starting  April 01
• US cellular – $0.005

Other fees by T-Mobile starting on April 01, 2021 (these are one-time fee)

• Campaign Service Activation Fee – $50
• Campaign Service Migration Fees – $50
• NNID Registration Fees – $2,000

T-mobile penalties for violation of practices/guidelines

T-Mobile will charge Syniverse the following penalties and it will pass through these fees to its clients. These are proposed and have not implemented and we are not sure if T-Mobile will follow through:

• Text Enablement – If traffic is being sent from a long code prior to the program being fully approved by T-Mobile – $10,000
• Grey Route – if you attempt to route A2P messages as P2P messages after 10DLC has been enabled. – $10 per each 10DLC messages sent through grey route
• 10DLC Long Code Messaging Program Evasion – if a program is fond to use evasion techniques like snowshoeing, unauthorized number replacement, and dynamic routing – $1,000
• Content Violation – this applies to each unique instance of the third or any subsequent notification of a content violation involving the same content provider. Examples of content violation;
  • SHAFT (sex, hate, alcohol, firearms, tobacco)
  • Spam or Phishing that meets the threshold of a Severity 0 violation per the CTIA short code monitoring handbook