Key Takeaways
- Scenario 1246 is *260# water-user committee vote then village SMS — not distribution-eve, surveys, *182#, KYC, disaster, cash-for-work, school-feeding, complaint, livestock, poll *180#, borehole *210#, birth, nutrition, vax, cash, camp, ANC, school-roll, *360# nets, or *400# teachers.
- A USSD 200 without the follow-up SMS is a vote logged in HQ the village never hears about.
- Priced by devices and SMS send volume. You use your own phone and operator SMS credit. Free is 300 SMS lifetime, 1 device. Developer is 25,000 SMS per year.
- Starter is 2 devices; the field spare still counts.
- Hold donate blasts until vote confirmation SMS drains.
- Canary *260# plus SMS at 15:20, not at HQ 09:00.
Summary
Scenario 1246 is a water-user meeting: *260# records the vote, SMS confirms the village, donate CSV waits until receipts drain. Service pricing is based on device count and total SMS sent through the gateway. You need a working Android phone with a SIM and SMS credit from your mobile operator. Operator message costs are yours—we do not sell carrier SMS balance.
If HQ counts match and households never got the SMS, you inventoried votes. You did not close the meeting.
Not a CodeCanyon “NGO SMS” pack. Device meters apply — Twilio vs Android SMS gateway.
Key takeaways
- Scenario 1246 is *260# water-user committee vote then village SMS — not distribution-eve, surveys, *182#, KYC, disaster, cash-for-work, school-feeding, complaint, livestock, poll *180#, borehole *210#, birth, nutrition, vax, cash, camp, ANC, school-roll, *360# nets, or *400# teachers.
- A USSD 200 without the follow-up SMS is a vote logged in HQ the village never hears about.
- Priced by devices and SMS send volume. You use your own phone and operator SMS credit. Free is 300 SMS lifetime, 1 device. Developer is 25,000 SMS per year.
- Starter is 2 devices; the field spare still counts.
- Hold donate blasts until vote confirmation SMS drains.
- Canary *260# plus SMS at 15:20, not at HQ 09:00.
Related reading
USSD gateway use cases, two-way SMS, how an Android SMS gateway works, WHO water, sanitation and health.
Context
Committees meet at 15:30. Villages want the result before dusk. Fundraising still wants an appeal CSV.
Free (300 SMS lifetime) is a rehearsal cluster. Developer is 25,000 SMS per year.
Core scenario guidance
*260# is committee vote, not borehole *210# repair. Timezone is the village, not the capital office.
Water USSD roles
| Role | When | Typical fail |
|---|---|---|
| *260# vote + SMS receipt | 15:30–18:00 village local | Phone in a locked pump house after dusk |
| Duplicate vote flag | Same household_id same meeting | Second *260# treated as a new vote |
| Staff OTP | Transactional, own pool | Dumped onto the water SIM |
| Donate / appeal | Held until last receipt SMS | Released at 15:30 into field SMS |
Cost and ownership
Priced by devices and SMS send volume. You use your own phone and operator SMS credit. The field spare is a billed device. Duplicate USSD still burns airtime.
Name a 15:00–19:00 on-call for meeting afternoons, not only HQ weekdays.
Operations
15:20 canary *260# and SMS. Abort: hold donate, keep staff OTP, skip a second “all villages” blast. Do not “resend district.”
Security and compliance
Short receipts. No household roster plus GPS in one SMS. Authenticate MIS hooks. Donate lists are promotional.
Decision guide
Ship when 15:20 canary is green and the radio stays powered past dusk. Delay if phones lock in the pump house at 16:00. If handsets are forbidden, CPaaS for staff OTP.
Checklist
- Field SIM paired before 15:00.
- 15:20 canary *260# + SMS.
- Spare live before dusk.
- Staff OTP isolated.
- Donate held.
- Airtime before 15:00.
- Battery exemptions.
- Village locale.
- Meeting-afternoon on-call named.
- Device cap includes spare.
Next steps
Review device and SMS volume pricing, device setup, SMS API documentation.
Deep dive: production hardening
Generators dying at 16:30 is an outage mid-vote. Watch USSD session + SMS DLR, not MIS 200s.
Deep dive: scaling and failure modes
Multi-district meeting weeks add devices before inventing a hidden unlimited-handset SKU. Raise OEM ceilings; fair-use remains.
Deep dive: integration discipline
Idempotency on household_id + meeting_id + kind (ussd|sms). MCP is a REST wrapper — live fields in Developer Center.
Priced by devices and SMS send volume. You use your own phone and operator SMS credit.
15:20 committee drill
Canary *260#. Confirm receipt SMS. Hold donate during the wave.
Related product pages
Jump to the live product docs for this topic—not another long-form article.
- USSD balance and menu automationOperator USSD codes
- SMS API documentationLive endpoint reference
- device and SMS volume pricingPlans and allowances
- PHP REST send samplesPHP code examples
