EmpireVault's phone numbers work on a bring-your-own-provider model: you connect your own Twilio or Telnyx account, and that provider bills you directly for the number and any usage - there's no separate EmpireVault phone bill, and no shared master account. EmpireVault stores your credentials encrypted, the same pattern as connected email accounts. A typical single-number setup runs about $25-40/mo on Twilio, less on Telnyx.
If you don't already have one, both providers offer self-serve signup - no sales call required. Twilio is the larger ecosystem and the easiest starting point; Telnyx tends to run cheaper per message and per minute. Either works with EmpireVault.
Twilio shows your Account SID and Auth Token right on the console home page after you sign in. Telnyx shows an API key under API Keys in the portal, alongside a Public key (used later to verify webhook requests).
Go to Platform > Integrations > Phone & SMS (admin only) and click Connect provider account. Pick Twilio or Telnyx, paste in the credentials, and submit - EmpireVault verifies them against the provider immediately and tells you if they're rejected. Re-verify credentials re-checks the same way later (useful after rotating a token); Disconnect removes the account once every number on it has been released.
Click Add a number on the Phone & SMS page. Search for a new number by area code and click Buy - your provider bills the monthly number fee immediately. Or check the numbers already on your provider account table and click Claim to link one you already own there into EmpireVault.
EmpireVault doesn't auto-provision your provider's webhook URLs - after adding a number, open it in your provider's console and point it at EmpireVault yourself. This is a one-time step per number; calls and texts won't reach EmpireVault until both are set.
https://app.empirevault.com/telephony/<provider>/voice (HTTP POST). On Twilio, set this on the number's configuration page. On Telnyx, create a TeXML application and point it here - and assign the application an Outbound Voice Profile (Voice > Outbound Voice Profiles), or call forwarding will fail instantly and every call will drop straight to voicemail: Telnyx treats the forwarded leg as an outbound call and rejects it without a profile.https://app.empirevault.com/telephony/<provider>/sms (HTTP POST). On Twilio, the same number configuration page. On Telnyx, the number's messaging profile.Each number has its own Settings page: a friendly label, a marketing source label (calls and texts to this number tag any lead they create with this source, for attribution), a forward-to number, and a voicemail greeting. The greeting can be typed text that's read aloud, or you can upload an MP3/WAV recording (up to 5 MB) that plays instead - handy when a brand name needs an exact pronunciation. Forward-to accepts US/Canada numbers only. Release removes a number from your provider account entirely and can't be undone.
A call to a connected number rings your forward-to number for up to 20 seconds; answer it and the call connects normally, showing your EmpireVault business number as caller ID - so you can tell it's a forwarded business call, and calling back reaches your tracked number. Every forwarded call is capped at 4 hours as a toll-fraud safeguard. If the call isn't answered - no answer, busy, or the line can't be reached - the caller hears your voicemail greeting and can leave a message.
Every voicemail is recorded and transcribed automatically, stored with the call. A caller EmpireVault hasn't seen before automatically becomes a new lead - scored from the transcript once it's ready - and shows up in your CRM leads list, the same as a chat conversation or form submission. Recent calls and voicemail activity are visible on the Platform > Integrations > Phone & SMS page.
On a number's settings page, admins can turn on an automatic text reply for calls that go unanswered. Configure a template - the {{name}}, {{business_name}}, and {{booking_link}} tokens fill in automatically - along with a quiet hours window (no texts before/after set times) and a daily send cap. Each caller gets at most one text-back per number every 4 hours, and the number still has to be past A2P registration (below) before a text-back can actually send. A number with no forward-to (voicemail-only) treats every call as missed, so callers get a text-back even when they hang up without leaving a message.
A reply of STOP (or STOPALL/UNSUBSCRIBE/CANCEL/END/QUIT/REVOKE/OPTOUT) immediately stops that caller from receiving any further texts from your number, including text-backs. START (or UNSTOP/YES) reverses it. HELP is acknowledged without changing their opt-out status. This is separate from, and in addition to, the carrier-level opt-out handling built into A2P registration below.
Texts to and from a connected number appear as conversations in the unified inbox on the calendar subdomain (Email & Calendar > Inbox), interleaved with email - use the Texts filter to see just SMS conversations. Open a conversation to read the full thread and reply with a plain-text message.
You can also start a text from a contact or lead's page in the CRM: when the record has a phone number and your tenant has an SMS-enabled number connected, a Send a text field appears there. Sending creates (or continues) that contact's SMS conversation, and recent calls and texts also show on the contact or lead's own activity view.
Visibility: SMS conversations are visible tenant-wide to everyone with Email & Calendar access - this is different from email accounts, which are monitored per user. Anyone on the team with inbox access can see and reply to any text conversation on a connected number.
Each outgoing text shows a delivery status once the provider reports back: delivered, undelivered, or failed with the provider's error when it doesn't go through. The Phone & SMS page also shows a rolling 7-day deliverability line per number (texts sent vs. failed, as a percentage), so a number with a carrier-filtering problem stands out.
Occasionally a send can get stuck showing "sending" for several minutes - usually a background-worker hiccup rather than a provider problem. A stuck message gets a Stuck badge and a Mark failed button on the Phone & SMS page. This does not resend the text - the provider may have already delivered it before the worker died, so resending risks sending it twice. Marking it failed only clears the stuck state; verify with the recipient before sending anything again.
A text can also stick the other way - sitting in queued for a full day because no worker ever picked it up (for example, the app restarted before the send ran). After about 24 hours a queued text gets the same Stuck badge and Mark failed button; unlike a stuck "sending" text, a stuck "queued" one was almost certainly never delivered, so it is safe to send again once you have confirmed with the recipient.
US carriers require every application-sent text to come from a number registered under A2P 10DLC - this is a carrier rule, not an EmpireVault restriction, so texting starts off on every new number until registration completes.
Registration happens in your own provider console. The SMS compliance card on the Phone & SMS page deep-links straight there - Open Twilio A2P console or Open Telnyx 10DLC console - where you register your brand (your business identity) and then a campaign (what you're texting about and how people opt in).
Back in EmpireVault, the compliance card shows live status for brand registration, campaign approval, and which numbers are attached. Click Refresh status to pull the latest state from your provider - a number's SMS status flips from "Pending A2P" to "Enabled" automatically the moment every step shows approved, with no separate switch to flip.
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