SMS alert features that put each alarm on the right cellphone
Welco's 12 SMS alert features turn the alarm that matters into one short text for the person on call, and let everyone else sleep. They decide which alert emails become texts, whose phone gets each one and what it says. Every feature works on the emails your systems already send.
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- Nothing to install on your systems
- No per-user fees
- Try any change before a text goes out
Works by email with
- Ignition
- Nagios
- Metasys
- Cisco Unity
An alert email from alarms@wwtp.example.ca arrives. The Welco rule “Pump alarms after 6 p.m. go to the night phone” trims it, and Night operator, on call gets one text: “Welco: [Headworks] Raw sewage pump 2 overload trip at 2:37 AM. Reply STOP to opt out.”
Night operator, on call received: Welco: [Headworks] Raw sewage pump 2 overload trip at 2:37 AM. Reply STOP to opt out.
What Welco's alert features do for a Canadian crew
Each feature does one of four jobs. Start with the job your alarms need most.
The right person hears it
Rules, time windows and several phones per alert put each alarm in front of the person who should deal with it.
Texts stay short and calm
A long email becomes one line, a retried email buzzes once, and a storm of alarms stays a handful of texts.
You decide who can send
Only the systems you approve can text your team, and test mode lets you try a change before it goes live.
Proof by morning
Each text shows whether it was delivered, and replies from the phone land back in your mailbox.
One pump trip, followed through every feature
Here is the overload trip from the top of this page, at a wastewater plant on Eastern Time. Watch which feature steps in at each moment of the night.
The plant's HMI emails an overload trip
ALARM: Raw Sewage Pump 2 Overload Trip, Tag RSP2_OL_TRIP, Priority 1Approved sender, matching rule
The email comes from the HMI's approved address, so it's accepted. The body says TRIP, so the pump alert rule matches.
The night window picks two phones
It's after 6 p.m., so on-call routing picks the night operator. Headworks trips are critical, so the rule also copies the chief operator.
Trimmed to one line, sent once
The group, the pump and the time stay, and the footer goes. The mail server retried, but duplicate protection kept it to one text per phone.
The night operator's phone buzzes
Welco: [Headworks] Raw sewage pump 2 overload trip at 2:37 AM. Reply STOP to opt out.The operator answers from the pickup
On my way, 20 min outThe reply reaches the plant's alerts mailbox
The day crew reads it before their shift starts. The reply does not clear the alarm on the HMI.
Reply from the night operator: On my way, 20 min outThe plant superintendent reviews the night
Delivery reports show both texts as delivered, in order. Nobody else's phone buzzed.
Times are an example. Text delivery depends on mobile networks.
How Welco handles an alert, in 3 steps
Every feature on this page sits somewhere along this path. The email-to-text walkthrough shows it end to end.
Your system emails your Welco address
Point the alert email you already have at your Welco address. Only approved senders get through, so nobody else can text your team.
Rules decide what happens
Rules pick the phones, trim the text and drop the noise. Time windows send night alarms to the night phone, and flood control keeps a burst in check.
The right phone gets one short text
Each confirmed phone gets one text that starts with
Welco:. Voicemail and PDFs arrive as tap-to-open links, and replies come back by email.
Send one alert to Welco and see it as a text
Sign up with your Business Number (BN), verify your business and invite the staff your rules will text.
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Reach the right person
Use these when the real question is who should see this alarm, and when.
Alert rules
Match on the sender, the subject or words like TRIP and DOWN, then pick whose phone gets the text.
On-call and after-hours routing
Days go to the whole crew. Nights and weekends go to the one person on standby.
Several phones per alert
Text a critical alarm to two or three people at once, so one dead battery can't hide it.
Tap-to-listen voicemail and file links
Voicemail audio, photos and PDFs arrive as a short private link the on-call person opens from the text.
Keep texts short and calm
Use these when the phone buzzes too often or the texts are hard to read at a glance.
One-text alerts
Cut a long alert email down to the site, the fault and the time. Our guide to alert text best practices shows what to keep.
Alarm flood control
Drop the all-clears and cap a burst, so the night a hydro outage trips every station stays readable. That night has a name: an alarm flood.
No duplicate texts
When a mail server delivers the same email twice, each phone still gets the alert one time.
Example alerts these features produce
Three texts from three kinds of systems. Each was trimmed to a single line and sent to the phone on call.
- SCADA well alarm: Welco: [Pump Station 2] Well 3 level LOW LOW alarm at 1:58 PM. Reply STOP to opt out.
- IT host down: Welco: [Server] Host DOWN - db-01 (10.5.160.9) at 3:12 AM. Reply STOP to opt out.
- Urgent voicemail: Welco: New voicemail on Tech Urgency Line from (231) 555-0100, 0:36. Reply STOP to opt out.
Stay in control of who can text your team
Use these to decide which systems may send, and to try every change safely.
Approved senders only
Mail from an address you haven't approved never turns into a text, so a stranger can't reach your crew.
Test mode
Run a new rule or system against real alerts and see each text it would send, with no texts out and no credits used.
Dedicated alert number
Alerts come from a number only your company uses. It's available for accounts in Canada and the US.
Prove delivery after a long night
Use these when someone asks the next morning whether the alarm got through.
Delivery reports
See whether each text was delivered and, if one wasn't, the reason in plain English.
Replies by email
A reply to an alert text is emailed to the alert's sender, so the day crew sees who answered and what they said.
Where these features earn their keep
Every setup starts with a system that already emails alerts. Here is the feature each one leans on most. For your sector, see alert setups by industry.
- Pump & lift stationsFlood control during spring runoff
- GE iFIXNight alarms to the standby operator
- IgnitionRules on alarm priority
- NagiosText DOWN, keep RECOVERY in email
- PRTGLong sensor emails cut to one text
- APC UPSApproved sender for each UPS card
- MetasysAfter-hours alarms to the on-call tech
- Door forced & held openOne text per door event
- HVAC & rooftop unitsBoiler and rooftop faults to two phones
- Cisco UnityTap-to-listen voicemail links
- After-hours voicemailCallers reach the night phone
- MadgeTechFreezer excursions to several phones
Alert handling before and after Welco
The SCADA alarm pages and IT monitoring pages show the same change for each system.
Plain alert emails
- The alarm waits in an inbox until somebody opens it, which can be hours at 3 a.m.
- The carrier address went quiet. Bell retired Text via Email on December 31, 2025, per Bell's end-of-life notice.
- Every alarm and every all-clear buzzes the same phone, so people start to mute it.
- Nobody can say the next morning whether the text ever reached a phone.
Alerts with Welco
- The person on call gets one short text, day or night.
- Rogers and Fido email-to-text reportedly stopped working around June 2023. Alerts-only numbers stand in for those carrier gateways.
- Rules drop the noise and flood limits cap a burst before it reaches anyone.
- Delivery reports and emailed replies tell the whole story of the night.
Frequently asked questions
Which Welco features should I set up first?
Do these features need software on my systems?
How long does setup take, and who on our side does it?
Is there escalation if the first person doesn't answer?
What does a Welco alert text look like on the phone?
Welco:, then the alert in one short line, then Reply STOP to opt out. Long alert emails are trimmed, so most alerts fit in a single text. The alert wording comes from your own system's email. The examples above show three real formats.Can I try the features before any texts go out?
Do staff have to agree before these features text them?
Do I pay extra for each person or each feature?
See your own alarms as texts tonight
Sign up, verify your business and point one system at your Welco address.
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