> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.wifipadi.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Announcements

> Tell your customers about an outage, planned work, or anything else — by email and SMS.

An announcement is a message to the customers of one location, or all of them. It is the thing to reach for when the line is down and forty people are about to message you individually.

Go to **Announcements**.

<Note>
  Announcements need your **own** email and SMS accounts. Receipts and password resets send without them, but broadcasting to your whole customer base does not — see [Email and SMS](/email-and-sms). Set that up before an outage, not during one.
</Note>

## Sending one

<Steps>
  <Step title="Choose who it goes to">
    Pick a location, or leave it on every location. One location is right for a fault at that site; every location is right for something upstream that affects all of them.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Choose the type">
    | Type                    | Use it for                                                                        |
    | ----------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
    | **Service down**        | Something is broken now.                                                          |
    | **Service restored**    | It is fixed. Send this one — people who got the first message are waiting for it. |
    | **Planned maintenance** | Work you are scheduling.                                                          |
    | **General notice**      | New plans, price changes, opening hours.                                          |
  </Step>

  <Step title="Write it">
    A title and a body. Say what is affected, and when you expect it back. "We are working on it" without a time is the message that generates the most replies.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Pick your channels">
    Email, SMS, or both. The page checks each one before it sends and tells you if a channel is unavailable, rather than reporting success having reached nobody.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Send">
    The announcement is recorded with the time it went out and how many people it reached on each channel.
  </Step>
</Steps>

## Reading the history

Every announcement stays on the page with its recipient count per channel. That history is the point: during a long incident it tells you what you already said and to whom, so your second message follows on from the first instead of repeating it.

## Practical notes

* **Send a test to one location first.** Both channels cost you money per message at scale, and neither can be unsent.
* **SMS is short and expensive.** Put the detail in the email and use SMS for the one line that matters.
* **Restored messages matter more than outage messages.** People who never hear the fault is fixed keep assuming it is not.