Is there a way I can send text, or even just a numerical message, from my landline to my cell phone? My home security system (burglar alarm), made by ADT, obviously has the ability to call the monitoring service when the alarm is activated. I am currently not paying for a monitoring service, nor do I plan to start. It also has the ability to call up to 4 pager numbers and transmit a numerical message using digits 0-9 as well as * and #. Now, I can put my cell phone number for the pager number and it will call it. Of course, pagers are not much use anymore, particularly with SMS text messaging available on just about any cell phone. Is there a way to send the pager message to my phone’s SMS account from the landline?
There is a super convoluted way, perhaps: Set up a Google Voice account for your cell phone. Have your alarm call that. Set up Google VOice to take voicemails and text your cell phone with the transcript: Send your mobile phone calls to Google Voice voicemail - Google Voice Help
IDK, but you may have a alternative if your alarm system allow a pause character, many auto, dialers do (usually the * or # key). Pause allows for things like dial 9 to get a outside line, or dialing using a calling card. So you can have it call your cellphone, put in a bunch of pauses then some touch tones that would be played at the time of the recording of a voicemail.
It may also be helpful to switch your alarm to pulse dialing, even if don’t have a pause option, just add a bunch of 0’s at the end of your cell number, that takes time, and should not cause your cell phone voice mail to come out of record mode.
This also assumes the playing of the touch tones would not stop voice mail from recording.
Depending on the method, you will have your phone ring and hear tones or pulses, and know it’s your alarm, or hear it on voicemail. This will also be faster then texting, calls are instant if they can get through, texting sometimes not.
Texting to landlines may well be coming. I am in the UK and my new phone has this functionality. I would guess that it is an attempt to slow the migration of households away from landlines to mobile (cell) only.
Thanks for the replies. They’ve been helpful.
Additional research has revealed the following.
[ul]
[li]The alarm is made by Honeywell, not ADT. ADT is just the name of a nationwide monitoring/service company that brands Honeywell equipment with their own logo.[/li][li]Putting my cell phone number in where the monitoring service number is programmed is no good. Apparently, when it calls the monitoring service, it expects to receive a “handshake” signal and if it doesn’t, it hangs up and calls again. And again. And again… Not good.[/li][li]There are three programming registers for each pager number. The first holds the phone number, the second holds the “pager message”(digits 0-9, *, #, and a 2-second pause code). The third register holds the “report option code” (that is, does it page this number every time the system is armed/disarmed, if a sensor in a predefined zone is activated, or both)[/li][/ul]
While the Google Voice thing won’t work (the alarm system does not transmit a spoken message, only touch-tones), it did get me to think “outside the box” if you will.
You see, when voicemail is activated on my cellphone, a voice comes on the line telling you that Mr. High and Mighty is way too busy to deal with the likes of you, so you can leave a message at the beep (which will probably be ignored), or you can press 5 to leave a call-back number (which probably will not be called-back). If you press 5, you can enter any number (up to 13 digits–for less than 13 digits, you have to press # at the end of the number). Once the number has been entered, you have to press 1 to send the number as a Text Message page from the number you entered.
With this, I can program my phone so that all calls from my landline go directly to voicemail. Then program my alarm system to call my cellphone (by putting my cellphone number in Register 1), fill Register 2 with a couple of pause codes (to get past the greeting), a “5”, another pause code, then my trouble code (say “91101” to indicate an alarm from one of the perimeter sensors). This has to be followed with a “#”, another pause code, then a “1” to send the message. When I do this, I get a text from “91101” that says “Page From 91101”.
The other options (as best I can tell) are to either pay for 3rd party monitoring (at a cost of between $20 and $60/month), or I can get an Internet Access card for the system that I can connect to my internet router for about $100, which will send me much more detailed reports, and even allow me to activate/deactivate the system remotely.
I am going with the cellphone/page option, for now. Without it, the system is just a noisemaker. Of course, with this solution, all calls from my landline to my cell will go directly to voicemail, so I have to be sure anyone calling me from my landline knows this and is sure to leave a message. So far this year, I’ve already spent nearly $100 on batteries for no added security. Now, at least, I can get a message if there is a problem. If we decide to drop our landline, then I’ll probably go the internet option.
Suppose I don’t have a cell phone that can send texts, or I don’t have it with me or something. Is there a web site I can go to that will let me type in a text message and send it to a cell phone number or other texting address for me?
If you have internet access you can just use Skype.
Most carriers have an email to text system, like 1231231234@vzwtext.com for Verizon, or look it up for the other carriers. They’re called “email to SMS gateway” or some such.
You can also look into Google Voice, which is what I use on my SMS-blocked phone… it’s free unlimited texting in the US, but it’ll come from a Google Voice number instead of your actual phone number.
Your cell provider may have that. I know Verizon Wireless allowed me to log on to my account and send texts through a browser before I dumped them.
Yes, it’s called an “SMS Gateway.”
ETA: I can’t be the only one who read the title as “Texting from a landmine.” (Need answer fast?)
Thanks. And now that I know the phrase “SMS Gateway”, I can google it, which I just did, and I quickly found a wikihow giving the steps to send a text message from Google Gmail to somebody’s phone.
Now that the OP has been answered, I might as well say that I’ve been reading this thread title “Texting from a landmine ?” all morning long.
What, like, “Surprise !” or “Watch out for that next step, it’s a doozy” ?
bracketed *[ed:] *mine.
Since you’ve solved your problem well enough I’d like to hijack just a bit.
What value do you perceive you get from the message to your phone? IOW, let’s say you’re at work or at the grocery store and you get a txt/page from your alarm box. What now? What do you intend to *do *other than say “huh?”, and continue about your day as you’d planned?
I’m genuinely curious; I’m not trying to be argumentative. I’ve just never understood what benefit folks think they get from alarms, and especially from notifications from alarms. ISTM the false alarm rate is so high, and the practicality of calling the SWAT team or fire department each time the alarm reports is so low that they’re useless. But that’s just my uninformed going-in assumptions.
Educate me please. What concrete actions will you take when the alarm sends you a message and how do this actions improve the situation?
FYI, it’s got nothing to do with Gmail. It’s the carriers doing that (step 5)… you can email them from any service, using the correct format for each carrier.