Characters in Text Messages Incorrect

[SmartsheetGuru]

Hi,

I have an app that uses the Appsheet text messaging service. It works except we've had some instances where some recipients of a text message receive a missing character or an incorrect character.  For example,

Here is what the correct message looks like with the time of "8:10 AM". This is what was received by most, if not all recipients except for 1.

Here is what one recipient received (but as far as I know, no one else): Notice instead of "8:10 AM" it says "C:10 AM".  Also, you can't see because I have their name blacked out, but it is missing their last name and the pipe "|" character before the time.  So, some characters are missing and the 8 has been replaced with a "C".

Any known issues with the Appsheet text messaging service sending out messages with incorrect characters? The text message body is being generated with a start condition directly in the "Body" field of the text message Content on the task screen.

[WillowMobileSys]

Are you somehow tailoring the messages for each user?  If not, then I don't suspect anything wrong with your implementation simply due to the fact that all but one is getting the correct message.  

Does it happen consistently with this one person?  What is different about this one user - geographic location, device, service?  Do any other users ever get this same problem?

At the very least, I would report this to AppSheet.  

[SmartsheetGuru]

@WillowMobileSys Not being tailored to each user.  All recipients receive the same text message.

I was looking at the Twilio docs as I know Appsheet uses Twilio for the SMS messaging, and I didn't see any red flags.  Twilio should be able to encode characters like a pipe just fine.

It also doesn't seem to be related to iphone vs Android as we have seen characters missing from both types of devices, it's just not consistent.  

I'll report to Appsheet now, but wanted to check in here first incase there was something from experience that I wasn't aware of 🙂

[SmartsheetGuru]

This is what I have received so far: 

"Your app has perfect expressions; you can use them. It might be an issue with the AppSheet SMS API that led to the replacement of 8 with c.

For now, we are escalating your case to the specialist; if there is any update, we will inform you via email to the same email address."