What is does SMS vs. MMS mean?

SMS means Short Message Service, and MMS means Multimedia Messaging Service. SMS allows Members to send a message that is up to 160 characters long, while MMS allows Members to send a message that contains media such as pictures or videos.


How long can a Message be to a Contact? 

Texts to Contacts can be as many characters as needed. Some important things to keep in mind is that some phone carriers will break up long messages into multiple shorter messages, which can come into the Contact's cell phone at different times. Another consideration is if a message is longer than 160 characters (for most carriers), it will be sent as an MMS message. The majority of plans now include MMS messaging, but there are occasionally people who don't have a cell phone plan that includes MMS.  


Rules regarding how Rhinogram delivers messages to your contacts:


  • Messages that contain emojis: 

    • Messages < or = 250 characters will be delivered as an SMS message to the patient’s carrier (AT&T, Verizon, T Mobile, etc). 

    • Messages >250 characters will be delivered as an MMS message.

  • Messages that do NOT contain emojis: 

    • Messages < or = 500 characters will be delivered as an SMS message to the patient’s carrier (AT&T, Verizon, T Mobile, etc). 

    • Messages >500 characters will be delivered as an MMS message.


How does this apply to an Organization?

SMS messages are often delivered in segments to the patient/contact. The higher number of characters in the message, the more likely the patient is to receive multiple message segments. 


Example: If a message has 1000 characters and has NO emoji, then the message will be delivered as 1 MMS message to the patient’s carrier and most likely delivered as 1 message to the patient.


However, if the message has 400 characters and has NO emoji, then the message will be delivered as 1 SMS message to the patient’s carrier and most likely delivered as 2-3 messages (each message may contain 140-160 characters otherwise known as segments). 



Patients aren't receiving pictures from our organization office, why is that?

Files, images, and videos can be sent through Messaging, RhinoSecure, and Facebook Messenger. Message type and File Delivery info is below: 




Does the patient have to make sure their pictures are under a certain file size?

No, when patients send pictures into Rhinogram it will autoresize the image when it is delivered. 


Why do inbound and outbound messages come in out of order or duplicate?

When duplicate messages are appearing in Rhinogram it's caused by the carrier (AT&T, Verizon) Rhinogram is attempting to interface with. When your device is in a low coverage area (or it disconnects to the network), the device or network may try re-delivering messages as it reconnects. This results in sending or receiving texts out of order or sending and duplicate text(s). Your contact's phone could also be the one doing this.


What is the character limit for SMS messages for each carrier?

AT&T:

  • The maximum length of text message that you can send is 918 characters. However, if you send more than 160 characters then your message will be broken down into chunks of 153 characters before being sent to the recipient's handset

  • The AT&T mobile broadband network delivers picture, video, or audio messages of up to 1MB: Larger media file attachments are compressed before sending to keep the message size below 1MB.

  • For more information visit: https://forums.att.com/t5/Data-Messaging-Features-Internet/MMS-Size-Limit/td-p/5040252


Sprint:

  • If you have a Sprint phone, you can send and receive text messages of up to 160 characters with any major U.S. wireless carriers and many international wireless carriers.

  • Nextel users have Web-based text messaging and have a 500-character limit.

    • Note: Some Nextel phones purchased before 2000 have a 140-character limit.

  • Exceeding maximum character limit: Only the first 160 characters of the message will be received on Sprint phones; only the first 500 characters of the message will be received on Nextel phones.

  • The character limit includes the composed message and sometimes the recipient's email address, the subject and callback number.

  • For more information visit: https://www.sprint.com/en/support/solutions/services/find-out-the-character-limits-of-text-messages.html


T-Mobile:

  • Messages are limited to 160 characters. If a message exceeds 160 characters, it's automatically converted to a picture message (MMS). See "Picture messaging," below.

  • Because of the larger size, a picture message can sometimes take longer to get to your mobile device than a text message (SMS).

  • Videos can only be sent between handsets that support video messaging.

  • For more information visit: https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-3309


Verizon:

  • Standard text messages (SMS) can have up to 160 characters. Extended text messages (EMS) can have up to 1000 characters. Multimedia messages (MMS) can have up to 1000 characters in addition to pictures, videos, sound clips and more.

  • If you write a text message that's more than 160 characters, the message will send as an EMS. Depending on the wireless carrier and device, the recipient may receive the message as a single message or as multiple messages in a row.

  • For more information: https://www.verizonwireless.com/support/text-messaging-faqs/