Can I use Sonic phone number for SMS texting?

[krellan]

Can I use the Sonic phone number to send and receive SMS text messages?

I was hoping to do this with the Sonic Mobile Communicator app, but couldn't find a way. The "Chat" function in the app doesn't do this, unfortunately, as it seems intended for some other backend, not SMS texting.

I tried to text the Sonic phone number, from a few different cell phones, and all of the text messages disappeared into a black hole. No error message came back from the network, but no message delivery ever happened on the Sonic Mobile Communicator app either. The texts were simply lost.

To me, texting would be a lot more useful than voice calling service. I hope Sonic can add texting to the Sonic phone number.

[virtualmike]

I can't help with the question you asked, but if you're simply looking for another number to use for texting, you can get a Google Voice number for free.

With it, you'd do texting functions on the GV app (or in a web browser), but you could have it send phone calls directly to your Sonic number and/or your mobile number.

Note, however, texting through GV is basic (think like texting in 2010). It doesn't support the enhanced features that iMessage and RCS have.

[krellan]

Thanks. I am aware of Google Voice, and I have a number (I've had it for years now, it's great).

However, I was hoping to use the Sonic number. Reason is, the phone number with Sonic is one I ported in a long time ago, and I've had that number for a while, so I'm in people's contacts and such already with it. There's even some old business loyalty cards and such that I activated using that number, and now that everything seemingly requires those 6-digit codes received by text message for authentication, I've been locked out of some of them, because the Sonic number can't receive texts. So, that's my reason for asking.

[virtualmike]

Got it. If the number ported in was not a mobile number, I'm surprised that the businesses would assume that it suddenly became one!

If you really want the number for texting, you could port it to GV (via a stop with a mobile carrier--GV's requirement). However, others have noted challenges with porting out, so I can't claim that it's easy.

If it's any consolation, I'm not aware of any ISPs' VOIPs offering text capabilities.