Registering for US business texting has two charges: a one-time fee each time a campaign is registered, and a small monthly fee for every campaign you keep active. Both are flat, so there's one number to reason about instead of a stack of carrier line items.
This guide covers what each fee is, when it applies, how you pay it, and what happens if it can't be collected.
The two fees#
| Fee | Amount | When |
|---|---|---|
| Registration | $19.50 | Once per campaign registration. Paid by card, non-refundable |
| Campaign maintenance | $2.00 / month | For each approved campaign, while it stays active. Debited from your wallet |
Both are quoted in US dollars to every customer, whatever your billing region. If your subscription bills in another currency, the conversion happens at checkout, the same way wallet top-ups work.
Registration needs a plan that includes texting
You can't register for A2P during a free trial, or on Solo, so those workspaces can't send from a US local number. Texting starts on the Team plan: start one first, then register.
Brand registration itself is free
You're charged for registering a campaign, not for registering your business identity. A brand registration on its own costs nothing, and neither does resubmitting a brand.
When the $19.50 applies#
The same price covers every campaign registration event:
- A quickstart registration. Brand and first campaign together, charged at checkout.
- A standalone campaign registration. If your brand was registered on its own, it was free, so your first campaign is charged.
- Your second or third campaign.
- A resubmit after a carrier rejection. Carriers bill for every vetting attempt, so a rejected campaign costs $19.50 to send back.
- Re-registering a campaign that was torn down for non-payment.
What isn't charged#
- Brand registration, and brand resubmits after a rejection
- Internal build failures on a campaign, where the submission never reached the carrier. Those retry for free.
How you pay#
The two fees are collected differently, and neither is something you pick:
- The $19.50 registration fee is paid by card. Submitting opens a secure hosted checkout page and the charge goes through there. There's no other way to pay it, so you won't be asked to choose.
- The $2.00 monthly fee is debited from your dialnote wallet, so keep a balance on it.
Keep a card and a wallet balance
Because the two fees use different rails, a working card alone won't keep you registered: an empty wallet still stops the monthly fee from being collected. Auto-recharge in Wallet is the simplest way to avoid that.
The amount is always shown before you submit
Every review screen shows the fee next to the button that spends the money, and the server decides the real amount. If nothing is due, for example because a quickstart already paid for your first campaign, you won't see a charge.
Refunds#
The $19.50 and the $2.00 are treated differently, so it's worth separating them.
The $19.50 registration fee is non-refundable, with one narrow exception:
- Refunded: internal brand build failures you can't act on, where the carrier never saw your submission and you can't move forward at all.
- Not refunded: carrier rejections. The carrier consumed the fee reviewing your submission, rejection included.
The $2.00 monthly fee is refunded if the carriers reject that campaign. You paid it at submit for a registration you didn't end up getting, so it comes back as wallet credit, usually the same balance you'd draw on to resubmit.
Internal failures always retry free
If a submission fails on our side before it ever reaches the carrier, the retry costs nothing. You're only charged for attempts a carrier actually reviewed.
Monthly billing#
The $2.00 monthly fee applies per approved campaign and comes out of your dialnote wallet, so your plan's monthly credit usually absorbs it. Adding a campaign mid-cycle bills the full month rather than prorating.
If your campaign was approved before these fees launched, you'll get a one-time email giving you 30 days notice before monthly billing starts for you. Anyone who registered after launch agreed to the fee at submit and won't get that email.
If the fee can't be collected#
Sometimes the charge fails: an empty wallet, a card that stopped working, or a subscription that's already behind on payment. If that happens, dialnote emails you on day 14 with the amount owed and the date you'd lose the registration. If it still can't collect by day 30, the campaign is deactivated.
When a campaign gets torn down#
An unpaid monthly fee isn't the only thing that ends a registration. dialnote deactivates campaigns and removes them at the carrier when:
- The $2.00 monthly fee goes uncollected through the full grace window
- The campaign has no phone number attached for 30 days, with a nudge at 14
- You cancel your subscription
- Your subscription expires at the end of its period
- The account is deleted
A campaign with no number attached gets torn down
If you detach every number from a campaign, the clock starts. Carriers charge a large monthly penalty for a registered campaign that isn't sending from anything, so dialnote deactivates it rather than pass that on. You get 30 days, which is plenty for swapping numbers or pausing texting for a while, and attaching any number clears it immediately.
A torn-down campaign has to be paid for again
Coming back means registering the campaign from scratch: the full $19.50 again, plus the carrier wait. The registration genuinely no longer exists at the carrier, so there's nothing to restore.
Your brand survives
Only campaigns get torn down. Your brand registration is never deleted, so a returning customer re-registers just the campaign rather than starting the whole process over. Brand registration is free anyway, so there's no charge hiding in that half.
Next steps#
- A2P quickstart - the fastest route to an approved registration
- A2P registration - campaign limits, statuses, and resubmits
- Wallet - top up the balance these fees draw from
- Billing overview - plans, credit, and usage