Cell Phone SMS Emergency Notification System

Note that this may be tested once a semester to make sure it works correctly.

Your information will be stored securely and used ONLY under emergency circumstances. Your cell number will be kept private and NOT shared with anyone. You may return to the sign-up page at any time to add or remove a cell number. To change a cell number, delete the entry and add the new number.

You can also add an emergency email address if your wireless devices can receive email and you'd like to receive it in that format.

Other optional Notification Lists, besides this emergency list, may be developed and appear on this page at a later date for optional signup.

SMS message to your phone will appear to come from "35842" (or possibly, but less likely, "62346"). That is the number of our SMS provider, "2SMS". More information about our provider may be found at their website, www.2sms.com.

This service is FREE. However, your particlar cell phone provider and plan may charge you for receiving SMS messages. Consult your provider for details.

UIC Emergency SMS alerts.  For info visit sms.accc.uic.edu. Call 312-413-0003. 
Msg&Data rates may apply.  Reply STOP to cancel.

You will only receive this once. The cell phone carriers require that recipients be informed how to opt out via SMS. You can ignore this message. There is NO charge for this service. If you do decide to opt-out, use the LOGIN link above and remove your cell phone from the list.

1. Can you receive SMS messages from other sources? Have a friend send you an SMS message today to make sure your SMS service on your cell phone is *still* working. If it's not working, please follow up with your cell carrier.
2. Not all cell carriers deliver all SMS messages reliably, sometimes the messages simply don't arrive on the handset. It needs to be determined whether the problem is a one-time fluke, or if it happens consistently every time our SMS service tries to send a message to your phone.

   To do so, go back to the SMS Emergency signup page. You can use the link from www.accc.uic.edu. Once there, use the "SEND CODE AGAIN" button to have the verify code sent to you again. Or, if your phone is already verified, the button will read "SEND TEST MESSAGE".

3. If you have verified that messages sent this way do *not* arrive, while messages you receive from other sources still *do* arrive, check with your cell phone carrier to verify that you do not have any SMS blocks in place. Some carriers may block messages from all non-cell-phone sources unless explicitly told to do otherwise.

   In particular, you must ask specifically about "shortcode" SMS blocks. Some providers setup these blocks automatically. A "shortcode" is a 5 digit number, as opposed to a full 10 digit number you'd get from another cell phone. Our SMS provider sends from a shortcode, so having such a block in place will prevent messages from getting to you.

   When checking with the support staff of your carrier, you should note the exact time you tried to send a test message so that they can look in their logs. Also you should tell them that the messages are coming from "35842" (or possibly, but less likely, "62346"). That is the "shortcode" of the company we use to send out the SMS messages, so it will appear as the source of the message in their logs.

4. Finally,
   1. if your carrier insists that they never got the message, and
   2. if they have verified that there are no blocks in place,

   then please let us know so that we can look into the problem with our SMS provider. Please reply with as many details from your carrier's support staff as possible. If they gave you a case number, please provide us with that as well.

• Are you a Cingular user? Cingular sends bogus FROM lines, often with oddball numbers, perhaps like 36245 or 1110100058. Please read the body of the email to find the verification code we sent. It will be something like: Ibt0Q In fact, what we send right now, would look like:

  From: smsmail@uic.edu
  Subject: SMS Verification Code
  
  Enter Ibt0Q on the web page to verify this phone.

  But this might be mangled a bit by your carrier.
• You are typing the code into the web page, right? You cannot just send reply sms or email from your cell phone, you must use the web page.
• We always send the same code for each phone, so if you get a code that doesn't work, no sense in getting it again.
• With small fonts on cell phones, you might mis-read the code. We have tried compensate for common problems like this. But if it just doesn't work, send email to consult@uic.edu, and tell us your netid, what happened, and the verification code you received.