What is the Twilio SMS Integration
The Twilio SMS integration lets Timetics AI send text messages through your own Twilio account. You plug in your Twilio credentials and a sending number, and from then on booking confirmations, cancellations, reschedules and workflow messages go out as SMS from your number, alongside the emails you already send.
Why do you need this
Email gets ignored, text messages get read. A booking confirmation that lands as an SMS a few seconds after someone books is much harder to miss than one sitting in a promotions tab, and the same goes for a cancellation or a time change that a customer needs to know about right away. Because the messages leave from your own Twilio account, they show your number, your billing and your logs. If a customer says they never got the message, you can open the Twilio console and see exactly what happened to it.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Step 1: Add Your Own Phone Number to Your Profile
Do this first. Timetics AI sends the test message to the phone number on your user profile, and the connection will not save without one. Go to Dashboard → Settings → Profile, add your mobile number with its country code, and save.
Step 2: Collect Your Twilio Credentials
From the Twilio Console you need four things:
- Account SID — on the console dashboard, starts with `AC`
- API Key SID — create one under Account → API keys & tokens, starts with `SK`
- API Key Secret — shown once when you create the key, so copy it right then
- Phone Number — a Twilio number you own that is SMS capable, in full international format like `+14155551234`
Use an API Key and Secret rather than your Auth Token. Keys can be revoked one at a time without breaking everything else on the account.
Step 3: Open Integrations
Navigate to Dashboard → Integrations. Click the “Automation” tab, or type “Twilio” in the search box, and find the Twilio SMS card.
Step 4: Click Connect
Click “Connect” on the card. The “Twilio SMS Configuration” dialog opens. If your plan doesn’t include Custom SMS, the card shows “Upgrade to access” instead, and you need to upgrade before you can continue.
Step 5: Fill In Your Credentials
- Account SID — your Twilio account SID (e.g. `ACxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx`)
- API Key — the API key SID (e.g. `SKxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx`)
- API Secret — the secret that came with that key
- Phone Number — your Twilio sending number in international format (e.g. `+14155551234`)
Step 6: Send a Test SMS
The submit button on this dialog says “Send Test SMS”, not “Save”. That’s deliberate. Timetics AI sends a real message through the credentials you typed, to the phone number on your profile, before anything gets stored.
- If it arrives, the dialog switches to a green panel showing the account and the number the message came from.
- If it fails, the error straight from Twilio appears on screen. Usually it’s a bad secret, a number that isn’t SMS capable, or a trial account that hasn’t verified the destination number yet.
Step 7: Save
On the success panel, click “Save & Connect” to store the credentials, or “Edit” to go back and change something. You cannot save credentials that haven’t passed a test, which is why there’s no plain save button.
Step 8: Test Again From the Details Page (Optional)
Once connected, the card flips to “Details”. The Details page has its own “Send Test SMS” button that uses the stored credentials rather than typed ones. Handy later on to confirm the integration is still alive.
Step 9: Disconnect (Optional)
On the Details page, click “Disconnect”. The credentials are deleted immediately, with no confirmation prompt, and you’re taken back to the Integrations list. SMS sending stops; emails carry on as normal.
Key Functionality
Once connected, these events send an SMS:
- Booking confirmed, to your customer and to you
- Booking cancelled, to both sides
- Booking rescheduled, to both sides
- Workflow automation messages, to your customer and to you
Nothing else sends SMS. Password resets, email verification, team invitations and payment emails are email only. There is no SMS one-time password or two-factor login.
What You See on the Details Page
The Details page (Integrations → Twilio SMS → Details) shows the connection status, the account SID and the sending phone number. Your API secret is never displayed after you save it.
Prerequisites
- A plan that includes Custom SMS
- Permission to manage workspace integrations (owner, or a role with integration access)
- A phone number saved on your own user profile
- A Twilio account with an API Key and Secret
- An SMS capable Twilio phone number
Notes
Your profile phone number is not optional. It’s the destination for every test message, so the connection is refused without one. More importantly, if you later clear the phone number from your profile, the Twilio integration is deleted along with it and SMS sending stops. If texts suddenly go quiet, check your profile first.
Customer phone numbers are sent to Twilio exactly as the customer typed them into the booking form, with no country code added. A number entered as `555 123 4567` with no `+1` in front will be rejected by Twilio. If your customers are spread across countries, make it clear on your booking form that the number needs the country code.
SMS failures are quiet. Unlike email, a message that Twilio rejects does not surface anywhere in Timetics AI. The booking still completes, the email still goes out, and the failure is only recorded in the server log. The Twilio console’s messaging log is the place to check when something looks off.
The card mentions reminders, but reminders are currently email only. Event reminders do not go out as SMS even with Twilio connected.
Twilio charges you per message, on your own account. Volume depends on how many bookings you take, and every confirmation sends two messages, one to the customer and one to you. Worth setting a spend alert in the Twilio console before you turn this on for a busy calendar.
Trial Twilio accounts can only text numbers you’ve verified in the console, and they prepend a trial notice to every message. Upgrade the Twilio account before going live.
A note on credential storage: your Twilio API secret is currently stored unencrypted in the Timetics AI database. Use a dedicated API Key for this integration rather than sharing one with other systems, and revoke it in the Twilio console if you ever disconnect.
Long numbers, short codes and A2P registration: in the US and Canada, application-to-person SMS from a standard 10 digit number needs A2P 10DLC registration with Twilio before messages will deliver reliably. That’s handled entirely on Twilio’s side. If your test message arrives fine but real bookings produce silent failures, unregistered A2P is the usual reason.