Enrol a phone number for Bp Comms SMS

Patients must have a date of birth recorded and enrol their mobile number before they can receive SMS messages.

Bp Premier offers single-step confirmation on phone number enrolment (patients receive a confirmation message that they've enrolled) or two-step verification (patients must return a validation code to your practice to confirm their mobile number).

Do I have to enforce phone number validation for enrolment?

Phone number validation options are set in Setup > Configuration > Bp Comms. Tick Mobile number verification is required if you want to your practice to confirm a patient's mobile number by entering a validation code before that number is enrolled in Bp Comms SMS. See Set up Bp Comms for SMS for more information.

What if two or more patients at a practice share the same phone number?

It is possible for multiple patients to receive SMS messages to the same mobile number. When a patient is enabled for SMS, if there are other patients with the same mobile number, a warning prompt will appear showing the other patients and whether they are enabled to receive messages.

Best Practice Software recommend that, if patients wish to share a mobile phone number (for example, a family), your practice use a manual hard-copy method of recording such 'joint' consent, and attach the document to the patient's clinical record.

My practice uses third-party software that might update a patient's phone number

If your practice uses third-party software that updates the Bp Premier database, changing a patient's phone number will affect their enrolment in Bp Comms SMS.

If a patient's enrolled phone number is changed outside of Bp Premier, the new phone is stored as 'pending' and the old phone number is retained until approval. The first time a user opens a window in Bp Premier from which the patient's demographics can be updated (such as various appointment book, billing history, or account screens), Bp Premier will alert the user that the patient's number has been changed outside of Bp Premier and prompt the user to accept or reject the change.

If the user accepts the change, your practice's confirmation or validation preference (one-step or two-step) for accepting SMS enrolments will apply.

Bp Premier has contacted all known Third-Party Providers regarding this change, and recommended that third-party providers accommodate this change by informing patients that their mobile number will not be updated at your practice until they attend for their appointment and confirm the change of mobile number.

NOTE  This change only applies to 'updating' and not recording mobile numbers for new patients or where a mobile number did not previously exist.

Last updated 23 July 2020