Verizon Wireless Monthly Spending Cap

Verizon Wireless imposes a monthly spending cap of $100. Please note that this spending cap is to be applied on a calendar-month basis. This means that if someone signs up for a mobile chat campaign on September 28th, he can spend up to $100 between September 28th and September 30th, and another $100 from October 1st to October 31st.

Verizon Phone Blocking

Verizon now allows subscribers to block the delivery of Premium Billed SMS messages. When a content provider attempts to send a PSMS message to a blocked phone, Verizon will return a specific error code, and the content provider needs to send a zero rated message to the subscriber to inform him of the blocking.

Verizon will also block the delivery of MMS messages to subscribers of Verizon resellers such as Tracfone, Airvoice, Page Plus, or West End, etc. A specific error message will be returned.

If the content provider observes this error during the delivery of a message that is part of a subscription, the content provider needs to cancel the subscription, and confirm to the subscriber that his subscription has been canceled.

Monthly subscription reminder messages

The Consumer Best Practices Guidelines, issued by the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), specify that all subscription campaigns require a monthly reminder message. Before a program is renewed, a renewal message needs to be sent to the subscriber reminding him/her that the subscription is about to be renewed. The reminder message needs to specify the pricing as well as opt-out instructions. The guidelines are silent on how much lead time a content provider needs to give the consumer before actually renewing the subscription.

All US carriers require content providers to implement the MMA guidelines, but some carriers impose additional restrictions.

Verizon Wireless announces that consumers should be given at least a 2 business day lead time before a subscription gets renewed. This means that the monthly notification message needs to be sent out 2 business days before the renewal Premium SMS message is initiated.

Many content providers have been sending out renewal messages 10 or 20 minutes before sending out the premium sms message. This is no longer allowed by Verizon.

Verizon limits Premium SMS tariff to $9.99

Verizon Wireless announces an important change to their handling of new premium SMS campaigns. Effective immediately, the maximum price point available for new premium short code based campaigns will be $9.99.

This change only applies to new campaigns that are submitted to Verizon for approval. Campaigns that are currently running on price points higher than $9.99 can continue to do so.