Sending SMS Messages

Vantage includes the built-in functionality for sending SMS messages to mobile phones.

Please be aware there are additional charges for this service.

Purchasing SMS Credits

In order to send SMS messages within Vantage, you will first need to top up SMS credits on your account. The easiest way to do this, and to quickly check your balance, is to add the SMS Credits widget to your dashboard.

To do this, first switch to the dashboard panel. It has this icon:

Click to switch to your dashboard. If you haven't set up your dashboard before, it will be an empty grey area:

To add the SMS Credits widget, click the 'Add Widget' button and choose 'SMS Credits':

The SMS Credits widget will appear on your dashboard, which looks like this:

At the top of the widget, you can see your current balance. If you haven't bought SMS credits before, this is probably zero. Below, you can see options for buying various quantities of SMS credits. There are per-credit discounts for higher volumes.

When you click one of the purchase links, you'll get a confirmation window:

Click OK to accept the purchase. The amount will be added to your next invoice. The balance indicated on the widget should update immediately. If it does not update to reflect your purchase, please contact Vecsoft Support.

Sending SMS Messages

To send SMS messages, switch to the 'Messaging' panel. Then, click 'Send Message' in the toolbar and select 'Send Text Message'. A new message window will open:

To send a simple message to a single number, enter the number in the box next to 'Phone', type your message in the large space below, and click 'Send'.

Whilst you are typing your message, you can see a hint at the bottom which shows you how many credits your message will take to send.

Sending to many recipients at once

If you need to send messages to many recipients at once, you can create a text file that contains a large list of numbers. Then, click the icon in line with 'Add recipient' and select 'File':

Locate the file that contains the phone numbers. Vantage will

To create a new user, first selectanalyse the groupfile intoand whichextract youall wantunique mobile numbers. The results are then displayed in the userrecipients topane be placed, thenclickof the 'Newmessage User...' toolbar button. The user properties window looks like this:window:

A username must be entered, and should not contain any spaces or special characters. Upper or lower case letters make no difference. This is the username that the user will use when logging in to Vantage.

The user's real name is optional, but it is recommended to enter at least a forename, as this is used for display purposes in some views within Vantage.

Click the 'Select Roles...' button to choose which roles this user will have. The permissions that the user has will be a combination of the permissions provided by all the roles to which they belong.

You can selectthen moresimply thantype oneyour rolemessage usingand click 'Send' and the standardmessage Windowswill shortcutbe keys (Shift for range, CTRLsent to pickall individually).

Therecipients. credentialsPlease tab allowsnote, you to specify the methods the user can use to log in.

If the user will need to use the till, or any administrative functions of Vantage, they will need to be able to log in using a username and password. To do this, check the 'Enable password authentication' check box and enter a password into the text box below.

If the user will need to log in using a barcode scanner, typically for delivery drivers, check the 'Enable barcode scanner authentication' check box and type the barcode value in the text box below.

The 'Trust' options control how much Vantage will trust the user's authentication. Most tasks are unaffected by this setting, but some very sensitive operations, such as voiding orders, may require full trust. You may want to specify that certain authentication methods, such as barcode authentication, are not sufficient for these operations.

Roles & Permissions

To control user roles and permissions, click the second tab at the top of the editor window. The roles editor looks like this:

The list on the left shows the created roles. You can add, edit and remove roles using the toolbar buttons above the list. Select a role to view its permissions

The 'Administrators' role is built-in to Vantage, and cannot be deleted. Any user with the 'Administrators' is always granted permission for any action. It is recommended that you reserve this role for use only with users who are responsible for overall control of the system. Other roles display the permissions tree:

Permissions in Vantage are hierachical - ifensure you have anyenough permission,credits to send to the number of recipients you automaticallyare have all of the sub-permissions. This makes it quicker and easier to assign large sets of permissions in one go, with finer control still available if it is needed.targeting.

If a permission is ticked, any user with the role will have that permission. If it is not ticked, this role will not grant a user that permission, but they may still gain that permission from a different role. The 'solid square' in the check box indicates that the user does not have that entire branch of permissions, but does have at least one of the sub-permissions within.