FREE EMAIL TO TXT SERVICE, available at least as I write this, on this day Thursday the 6th of June 2008.

To send an email that will appear on someone's mobile phone as a SMS message

phonenumber@airpage.co.nz

ie. 027XXXXXXX@airpage.co.nz

phonenumber@airpage.net.nz has also been tested and works.

international code, ie +6427XXXXXXX does not appear to be required. When I test txt myself by (this) number, I get nothing.

I assume that this service is available only to New Zealand mobiles. I still haven't tested to vodafone 021 mobile numbers. Let me know if you have success with this.

There are similar services to this in overseas countries that charge the RECIEVER a small fee, sometimes more, sometimes less, than the usual txt fee. This does not appear to be the case as I can send to my phone which has no credit on it to spend, and querying this with Telecom customer services has also yielded no news that I will be charged for these messages at any point.

When i first learned about this I was informed that this service is owned by telecom. It's free now, but that could be a market research strategy. This may mean that vodafone cannot recieve airpage messages.

*** at a later time I write: ***

According to the airpage information page, which as I write this is available at http://www.telecom.co.nz/content/0,8748,201412-201962,00.html this service is provided for people that use Pagers, and they can subscribe to the service so that they can specify the address to be yourname@airpage.co.nz , and on this page it specifies that it costs 17c per message recieved. I wonder, if a pager has a number similar to a mobile phone number, does that mean someone can use thenumber@airpage.co.nz for free, whilst theirname@airpage.co.nz costs 17c a message? I would like to know if it is possible for mobile phone customers to subsicribe to the same thing.

The webpage does not at all mention that the service will forward free to ourcellphonenumbers@airpage.co.nz however I believe that this is one of those things that is let out of the bag, free, maybe for a short period of time in order for itself as a product to spread the word about the service for pagers, and also as a little bit of ammo for sales people to have up their sleeve when throwing more of the 'benefits of using telecom' onto the table.

01020304050607080910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940414243444546474849505152535455565758596061626364656667686970 = 140 characters = max characters allowed in each message sent via airpage. The website says 150 characters, however my phone only recieved up to 70 when I test sent the string of double digit numbers up to 99.


[Moderator (SP): Replaced the numbers after 027 with X's to keep the stalkers off your case]