Ultraner Buzz
In developmentMessage your customers from the same place you get paid.
Receipts, one-time codes, reminders and alerts by SMS and email, from one API and one dashboard, sent under your own business name. USD 0.01 per SMS segment.
In development. Buzz is being built now and is not generally available yet. The prices on this page are confirmed.
DUKABORA
Sender ID
Payment received: TZS 45,000 for order #1042. Thank you, Duka Bora.
Your Duka Bora code is 482913. It expires in 5 minutes. Never share it.
Reminder: your rent of KES 25,000 is due on 1 November. Pay at pay.example.com/r/88.
What it does
One API for the messages your business already has to send.
Your customers paid you through Ultraner. Buzz lets you tell them so, remind them what is due, and verify it is really them, without signing up for a second provider, learning a second API or reconciling a second bill.
SMS
Reaches every phone, smart or not, with no app and no data bundle.
Receipts and statements with room for detail, from the same API.
Template messages on the app your customers already use.
Pricing
A cent a segment.
Prices are set in US dollars and shown here converted at Ultraner's current rate.
SMS
USD 0.01
per segment
USD 10.00 per 1,000 segments
Sender ID
USD 1.89
per month, billed yearly
USD 22.67 billed once a year
What will my message cost?
Encoding
GSM-7
Length
104 characters
Segments
1
Per message
USD 0.01
Total USD 10.00
Standard SMS alphabet: one segment holds 160 characters, or 153 each when a longer message is split.
Sender ID
Your name on the message, not a random number.
A Sender ID is the name your customers see as the sender, like DUKABORA, instead of an unknown phone number. Messages look official, customers know who is writing before they open it, and networks are less likely to filter them as spam.
Approved per country
Each country's regulator and mobile networks approve Sender IDs themselves, one country at a time. Registration usually takes a few days.
Send while you wait
Until your Sender ID is approved, messages go out from Ultraner's shared sender, so nothing is blocked on the paperwork.
USD 1.89 a month, billed yearly
USD 22.67 once a year per Sender ID. The price in your currency is in the pricing section above.
How it works
- 01
Create your account
The same Ultraner account you take payments with. Nothing new to set up.
- 02
Request a Sender ID
Optional. Your business name as the sender, approved per country. Until then, messages go from Ultraner's shared sender.
- 03
Send
From the dashboard, or one API call with a number, a message and your Sender ID.
- 04
Follow delivery
Each message carries a status, so you can see what arrived and what did not.
curl https://api.ultraner.com/v1/buzz/sms \
-H "X-API-Key: uk_test_..." \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"to": "+255712345678",
"body": "Payment received: TZS 45,000 for order #1042. Thank you!",
"sender_id": "DUKABORA"
}'to
The number, in international format.
body
The message text. Billed per segment.
sender_id
Optional. An approved Sender ID.
This is the API being built. It is not generally available yet, and the final reference will be published in the docs when Buzz opens.
Use cases
The messages every business sends.
Receipts
Payment received: TZS 45,000 for order #1042. Thank you, Duka Bora.
One-time codes
Your Duka Bora code is 482913. It expires in 5 minutes. Never share it.
Reminders
Reminder: your rent of KES 25,000 is due on 1 November. Pay at pay.example.com/r/88.
Alerts
Your order #1042 is out for delivery and should arrive by 4pm today.
Questions
Before you send
What is a segment?
SMS is sent in segments. A message in the standard SMS alphabet fits 160 characters in one segment. One emoji or one character outside that alphabet (Arabic, Amharic, Chinese and so on) switches the whole message to Unicode, which fits 70. Longer messages are split, and each part then holds 153 characters (67 in Unicode) because a little room is used to join them back together. You pay per segment, so the calculator above shows exactly what a message will cost.
Which countries can I send to?
Buzz is being built for the markets Ultraner serves. The country list will be published on this page before Buzz opens, along with any country where a Sender ID is not available.
How do I know a message was delivered?
Every message has a status that moves from sent to delivered or failed, visible in the dashboard and available to your system, so you can retry or switch channel when a message does not arrive.
What if a message fails?
Failed messages are refunded. If a message cannot be delivered, for example because the number does not exist or the network rejects it, its cost goes back to your balance.
How long does a Sender ID take?
A few days in most countries. Each one is approved country by country by the regulator and the mobile networks, and some may ask for supporting documents. You can send from Ultraner's shared sender while you wait.
How much does email cost?
Email pricing will be published here before email opens. The prices above are for SMS and Sender IDs.
When is WhatsApp coming?
After SMS and email. WhatsApp needs a Business Platform provider and template approval, so it will open separately.
Is the API available now?
Not yet. Buzz is in development and the API shown here is the one being built. Ask to be told when it opens and we will email you.
More in Core payments
Ultraner Payments
LiveAccept mobile money, cards and PayPal through one API and one hosted checkout.
Payment Links
LiveA shareable link or QR code that takes a payment with no code at all.
Ultraner Invoices
LiveIssue an invoice and collect against it by mobile money, card or PayPal.
Be first when Buzz opens.
Create your Ultraner account today and take payments now. Buzz will appear in the same dashboard when it opens.