Question

Why do some of the special characters work when I send them through but others do not?

Applies To

• Short Codes
• Special Characters

Answer

Our short code product operates in the same manner as our SMS API in that they both send through a RESTful HTTP request. For a RESTful HTTP request the HTTP GET request must be URL encoded, therefore some special characters will need to be URL encoded so that they're translated properly by a web server.

The special characters ! @ $ * ( ) _ - + = ? < > can be sent without modifications via short codes however, # % and & need to be URL encoded.

There are multiple sites such as this URL encode/Decode Tool which can help you to properly encode or decode special characters. The special characters which need to be URL encoded are:

# which is %23 when URL encoded, %25 for %, %26 for &, and %2B +.