Send a Text Message

If your program has texting turned on, you can text a student from their profile and read their replies in the same thread. Use it to remind a student about a deadline or a document you still need.

To text a whole group at once, see Send a Text to Many Students.

Before You Can Text

You can text a student when all four are true:

• Your admin has enabled texting in Settings.
• Your program has a sending number, which TRIOPilot sets up for you.
• The student has a phone number on their profile.
• The student has opted in: their SMS Opt-In is Yes, and nobody in your program who shares that phone number has opted out.

A text to one student needs the student's recorded consent, as a group text does. The one exception is a reply to a student who texted your program in the last 72 hours. See When No Consent Is Recorded.

Advisors and admins can text students; assistants, observers and guests cannot. If the profile has no Text Messages tab, texting is off for your program or your role cannot text.

While texting is off, a student can still reply to an earlier text, and you are notified as usual. The profile then shows the Text Messages tab with the conversation to read, and a line that texting is off, but no message box. To answer by text, ask an admin to switch Text Messaging back on in Settings, on the Features tab, or reach the student another way.

Send a Text

1. Open the student's profile and choose the Text Messages tab. The whole conversation lives there: the thread, with the message box underneath it.
2. Read the consent banner at the top of the thread before you write anything.
3. Type your message and choose Send. Enter sends the message, and Shift plus Enter starts a new line. On a phone, Return starts a new line, and only Send sends the message.

What the consent banner is telling you:

• Green: the student has opted in. You can send.
• Amber: no consent is on record, but the student texted your program in the last 72 hours, so you can reply. The banner says until when, on your program's clock.
• Red: the student has opted out, or another student record in your program that shares the same phone number has opted out, because the opt-out belongs to the phone number. The message box is locked and sending is refused.

When no consent is on record and the student has not texted your program in the last 72 hours, there is no banner: the message box is locked, and a note above it says why and what to do.

When No Consent Is Recorded

A student whose SMS Opt-In has no answer, often a record imported from another system, cannot be texted. The note above the locked message box reads: "This student has no recorded consent to texts. When they agree to receive texts, set SMS Opt-In to Yes in the Contact Information card on their profile." Once you set it to Yes, the message box opens.

If the student texts your program, you can answer for 72 hours from their newest text, as many times as you need. The amber banner says when the 72 hours end, on your program's clock. After that, the message box locks again until the student texts again or their consent is recorded. Texts on that phone number to any student record in your program count. A STOP or an opt-out always blocks, inside the 72 hours or not. Texts imported from another system, and texts an admin added from an unknown number, do not count.

A group text never makes this exception: it goes only to students whose SMS Opt-In is Yes. See Who Does Not Receive a Bulk Text.

On a phone, tap Text at the top of the profile, or the phone number, and the pane opens with the message box at the bottom of the screen and the newest messages just above it. The top of the pane names the number the text goes to and says it sends from the program's number: a text never comes from your own phone. Each day's messages start with the date, and each text a staff member sent shows that person's name.

If your program has quiet hours for group texts and it is quiet hours now, a muted line under the thread says so. A text to one student still sends: quiet hours stop group texts, not a conversation. See Quiet Hours.

Texts and replies appear in that one thread, oldest at the top (very long histories show the most recent messages), so the whole exchange stays with the student's record. Each message you send shows its delivery status underneath it. A text the phone carrier could not deliver after it left is marked as failed under the message.

Long Links

A long web address uses up much of a text. When your message holds an address of more than 50 characters, a line under the message box says it will be sent as a go.triopilot.com link, and TRIOPilot replaces it with a short address before the text goes out, for example https://go.triopilot.com/AbC12. The student taps the short address and lands on the page you typed.

• Only an address that starts with http:// or https:// is shortened. Copy the address from your browser's address bar to be sure it does.
• An address of 50 characters or fewer goes as you typed it.
• The thread shows the text as the student received it, with the short address. To check where it goes, copy it into your browser's address bar.
• TRIOPilot does not count or record who opens a short address.
• A short address keeps working for as long as your program's texts are kept.
• If TRIOPilot cannot make the short address, the text goes out with the address as you typed it, and TRIOPilot support is alerted.
• If a student says a short address opens a page reading Link Not Found, the address was probably copied in part or mistyped. Send the full address again. A page reading Link Not Available means TRIOPilot could not look the address up just then, and it asks the student to try again in a minute.

If a Text Is Not Sent

Sometimes the texting service refuses a text before it leaves. When that happens, the text is taken off the thread, your message stays in the box so you can try again, and a note above the box says what went wrong. Anyone else viewing the same thread sees the text disappear within about 15 seconds.

Some of the notes you might see, grouped by cause:

• The number cannot take the text. The number is not valid, cannot receive texts (it may be a landline), or has opted out by replying STOP. Check the student's phone number on their profile. A student who opted out can reply START to opt back in.
• Texting is unavailable for your program right now. The problem is on the texting account or your program's sending number, not the student. Nothing was sent, and TRIOPilot support has already been alerted, so you do not need to report it.
• The texting service is busy. Wait a minute, then try again.

If the texting service does not answer at all, TRIOPilot cannot tell whether the text went out, so it stays in the thread marked unconfirmed and the note says so. Check with the student before you send it again, so they do not get it twice.

When the texting service refuses a text, or your program's texting setup cannot be used, the Audit Log records it as Text Not Sent, with the reason. When TRIOPilot blocks a text because a record on that number opted out, or because no consent is on record, it is recorded as Text Blocked, and Details says which.

When a student replies, the reply lands in the same thread and the student's assigned advisor is notified two ways: a notification in the bell that opens the profile straight on the Text Messages tab, and an email with the start of the message and a link straight to the conversation. Someone who chose Hourly Digest or Daily Digest under How Often We Email You on their account page gets that email as part of the digest instead. A program that does not want the email can turn it off under Settings, on the Emails tab.

If the student has no assigned advisor, or that advisor has been archived or has a role that cannot carry a caseload, each of your program's admins is notified instead, and the notification says why. Nobody is assigned automatically, so an admin decides who works with the student. A reply that only opts out, such as STOP, does not notify the admins: nobody needs to act on it, and the student's SMS Opt-In changes to No.

Consent usually comes from the text-message question on your application form. It lives on the profile as the SMS Opt-In field, in the Contact Information card unless your program has moved it, and you can change it inline to Yes or No when a student tells you they agree to receive texts or have changed their mind.

Staying Compliant

• Text only students who have opted in. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) requires consent, and TRIOPilot refuses a text to a student with no consent on record unless you are replying within 72 hours of their own text.
• Set SMS Opt-In to Yes only when the student has agreed to receive texts.
• If a student replies STOP (or STOPALL, CANCEL, END, QUIT, UNSUBSCRIBE, OPTOUT or REVOKE), TRIOPilot opts them out automatically and blocks any further texts. START or YES opts them back in. Both apply to every student record that shares that phone number.
• Do not set SMS Opt-In back to Yes yourself to get around an opt-out. That decision belongs to the student.
• Standard message and data rates may apply to the student. Keep messages relevant and infrequent.
• Keep sensitive details out of texts, such as Social Security numbers, financial details, grades or health information. A text passes through the phone carriers and Twilio, our texting provider, whose terms let it use message text for purposes they list, such as detecting abuse and developing its products. Use a call, a meeting or a secure document instead.
• A text is not a logged contact. If the exchange counts as a contact, record it. See Log a Contact.

If a Student Calls the Number Instead of Texting It

Some students phone your texting number instead of texting it. Your program decides what they hear. In Settings, on the Features tab, choose Manage on the Text Messaging row for the Forward calls to this phone number box.

• Fill it in (usually your main office line) and calls to your texting number ring there. The caller hears a short "please hold" message first, and your office sees your program's texting number on the caller ID rather than the student's number.
• Leave it blank and callers hear a short message telling them the number is for text messages and asking them to send a text instead.

Calls are forwarded at any hour, including evenings and weekends. If nobody picks up within 25 seconds or the line is busy, the caller hears "Sorry, we could not connect you" and is asked to send a text instead. The same message plays when your number cannot be reached at all, for example because it was mistyped or the line was disconnected. TRIOPilot records it when calls cannot be placed, and if callers tell you they always hear that message, check the number in this box. When your office answers, the caller hears nothing more after the call ends. You can enter US and Canadian numbers only, and you cannot forward to an extension, so use a number that rings a person or a voicemail box directly.

For Admins

To turn texting on, go to Settings, open the Features tab, and press the switch on the Text Messaging row. Your program's sending number and monthly text limit are set up by TRIOPilot, so email support@triopilot.com if you need either changed. The Forward calls to this phone number box under Manage on that row is yours to set and change whenever your office line does.

To turn texting off, press the same switch. If group texts are waiting to go out, a Switch texting off? box first says how many. A text that comes due while texting is off is stopped and never sent, turning texting back on does not bring it back, and nobody can open Scheduled Texts while texting is off. Choose Switch Off to go ahead, or Cancel to keep texting on. To keep a waiting text, turn texting back on before it is due.

Once texting is on, the row shows this month's usage against your limit (500 texts a month unless TRIOPilot has set yours differently), and Manage adds a history by month. Texts students send you count toward the limit, as do texts your staff send. The month runs on Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), so the count starts over at midnight UTC on the first, which on your program's clock is the afternoon or evening of the last day of the month, or, in Guam and the western Pacific, the morning or midday of the first. Manage shows that time on your program's clock. A text you schedule counts in the month it goes out, and the limit it must fit is that month's. Advisors get a heads-up in the message box once your program reaches 80 percent of the limit. At the limit, sending is blocked until the count starts over, and anyone who tries sees a message telling them the program has reached its monthly text limit and when it starts over. A group text can still be scheduled for the time the count starts over or later, because it counts in the month it goes out, as long as texts already scheduled leave room for it in that month; Bulk Texts says which (see Send a Text to Many Students).

Texts From Unknown Numbers

When someone texts your program's number from a number that is not on any student record, such as a new applicant or a parent, the text is kept for your program's admins instead of being dropped. Each admin gets one bell notification, New text from a number not on file, until they read it, and the Texts From Unknown Numbers email, which each admin can turn off on Your Account (see Manage Your Account). Texts of STOP, START or HELP from such a number are not kept, because the texting service answers them itself.

Admins open the texts from the bell, or from Unknown Numbers at the top of Bulk Texts (the number in parentheses is how many texts are waiting). The page lists one card per number, newest first, with its texts oldest first and the time on your program's clock. If the number has since been added to a student's profile, the card says whose. For each number:

• Add to a Student (in your program's own word for students): search for the student by name, email or phone, choose them, and confirm. Every text from that number moves into that student's Text Messages thread and leaves this page. Staff see these texts in the thread; the student never sees them in the student portal, because someone else may have sent them. The student's phone number on their profile does not change. Future texts from this number go to the student's thread only if the number is on their profile.
• Dismiss: confirm, and the number's texts are deleted. This cannot be undone.

Both are recorded in the Audit Log with the count and the last four digits of the number. If another admin already handled a number, the card says so; reload the page. To reply, add the texts to the student first, then text them from their profile, where the consent rules apply.

While texting is off, texts to your program's number still arrive, so the page still opens from the bell or the email and shows them, with a line that texting is off. Add to a Student and Dismiss come back when you turn Text Messaging back on.

Quiet Hours for Group Texts

On the same Text Messaging card, Quiet Hours stops group texts during a daily window on your program's clock, such as 9:00 PM to 8:00 AM. Check Do not send bulk texts during quiet hours, set the start and end, and choose Save Quiet Hours. Quiet hours are off until you set them. See Quiet Hours.

Texts in the Student Portal

If your program uses the student portal, the Student Portal row's Manage has a second switch, Show text messages in the portal. It is off until you turn it on. With it on, and texting on, a student who signs in to the portal sees the most recent 100 texts between them and your program, oldest at the top, read only, with a line telling them to reply from their phone. Texts that failed to reach their phone are left out, and so are texts an admin added from Texts From Unknown Numbers. See Find Your Way Around Program Settings.

For the rest of Settings, see Find Your Way Around Program Settings.