SMS Clocking with Esendex

Karishma Updated by Karishma

Introduction

This guide is intended to help set up SMS clocking on your T&A 8 system. This feature can be used by Employees to register Clockings using their mobile device via SMS messages. This is achieved by using a service called Esendex which will collate incoming texts, match them to employees in T&A 8, and provide clocking direction and times. This information will be delivered via an email (which will be sent when Esendex receives a text confirming the Employee’s Employee number and Clocking direction), which is received by T&A 8.

In order to use the SMS Clocking feature, you will require an account with Esendex, complete with a virtual number and enough SMS credits to cover your business requirements.

Enabling Messaging

To start, you must enable messaging on your T&A 8 system. Open the Header pane, and navigate to the System preferences. Open the Messaging preferences. There will be a preference marked Email source 1 active – enable this preference by ticking the checkbox.

You will then need to set up an email source for your Messages. Open the Messaging email source 1 preferences, and fill out the details:

Next, you need to set up an incoming server. This is the server that Esendex will deliver emails to. Open the Email preferences in the System preferences, and fill out your email server settings:

Test that Messaging has been set up correctly by sending a Scheduled message. Once this is verified, return to the System preferences. If Messaging is unsuccessful, check that all information has been entered correctly. 

Enabling Esendex

Once Messaging has been enabled on your system, you will need an Esendex account. An account can be created by contacting Esendex directly. See their website for more information.

https://www.esendex.co.uk/

You will need to create an account that gives you access to a Virtual number and SMS credits. Once created, make a note of your Account reference, User name, Password and  Virtual number. All of these will be necessary to pair T&A 8 with Esendex.

Open the System preferences, then open the Messaging Esendex preferences. On this page, you need to input your Account reference, User name, and Password:

Note: The Account reference number should be put into the Account box.

Next, return to the Messaging preferences and enable the Message source: Esendex source active (the setting that was previously set to Email source 1 active). 

Enabling Clocking updates via Esendex

To enable clocking information to be gathered by Esendex, you will also need to select a preference that enables manual updates. 

In the Messaging preferences, in the Actions box, there is a check-box labelled Allow manual updates. Tick this checkbox. This allows you to manually process SMS clockings. Additionally, if you plan to automatically process SMS clockings, tick the Process after polling checkbox that you can tick. When ticked, as long as the Poll interval is set to a value above 0, the Processor will automatically process SMS clockings.

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