Bulk SMS in Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal: Sender ID and Rules

What do the data protection laws mean for SMS?

Both countries have a personal data law, and a phone number used for marketing is personal data. In Côte d'Ivoire the law is Law No. 2013-450, and ARTCI acts as the data protection authority. In Senegal the law is Law No. 2008-12, overseen by the Commission de protection des données personnelles (CDP).

What this means in practice, without legal advice:

• Consent first. Our regulation data requires verifiable opt-in for marketing, with timestamped consent records retained for at least 12 months and produced on a regulator's request.
• Declare where required. Data protection authorities in both countries can ask controllers to declare or seek authorisation for their processing. Ask your counsel whether your customer database needs a declaration.
• Respect opt-outs. Every promotion carries STOP or equivalent wording, and DND-registry suppression is applied automatically where the regulator runs one.
• Check for changes. Senegal has reported plans to revise its 2008 law; confirm the current text with the CDP before relying on this summary.

We have not verified article-level obligations, penalties or filing procedures, so we do not state them. Use the opt-in consent generator for wording and read opt-in across channels for record keeping.

Which French letters fit in GSM-7?

Only some accented letters are in the default GSM 7-bit alphabet. é, è, à, ù, ü and É are in; ç, ê, ô, î, â, û, ë, ï, œ, À, È and the curly apostrophe are not (3GPP TS 23.038). One character outside the alphabet makes the whole message Unicode.

The third message is three characters over the Unicode single limit of 70, and it only turned Unicode because of "ç"; in plain GSM-7 it would have cost one message. Rewriting as "votre justificatif de paiement est disponible dans l'application" avoids the problem. Type a straight apostrophe, not the curly one that word processors insert, and avoid « » quotation marks. Preview every template in the SMS character counter; our guide to Unicode and Arabic SMS limits explains the mechanism.

How do banks and mobile money providers use SMS for OTP and alerts?

They use SMS for one-time passcodes, transaction confirmations and security alerts, because every phone receives SMS without an app or data plan. Keep this traffic separate from marketing.

1. OTP: a code, a validity period and a warning not to share it. Example, 87 characters, GSM-7, 1 message: Wallet Exemple: code de validation 731904. Valable 5 min. Ne le partagez avec personne.
2. Transaction alert: the fact, the card or account suffix and what to do if it was not the customer.
3. Never add a promotional line to either.

Protect OTP endpoints against abuse: see SMS pumping fraud prevention and our OTP message guide. For sector context, read banking and fintech customer messaging.

How do you test a launch in Côte d'Ivoire or Senegal?

Run a short, structured pilot before any large send, because filtering and delivery reports differ by network.

1. Register the sender ID and wait for confirmation on every network you will use.
2. Send one OTP-style message and one alert to test numbers on each operator, and note the delivery status and time received.
3. Check that the sender name displays unchanged and that French accents render correctly.
4. Send a small promotion to opted-in staff or customers, with STOP wording, and confirm the opt-out is processed.
5. Compare delivery reports across networks, then scale up in steps.

When should you send?

We have not found a regulator-published time-of-day window for promotional SMS in either country. Agree sending hours with the operator and schedule promotions for the recipient's local daytime. Transactional traffic runs 24/7. Both countries sit close to GMT, which helps when you send from Europe or the Gulf, but check the time zone you schedule in. The send time planner helps.

What about Togo, Benin and the rest of WAEMU?

Rules vary by country, and we publish no facts for countries outside this guide. Each member of the West African Economic and Monetary Union has its own regulator, data law and operator conditions. If you plan a regional rollout, ask our team to confirm sender ID, consent and route details for each destination before you build a single template for all of them.

A worked example: a regional bank sending from Abidjan and Dakar

"Banque Exemple" (synthetic) runs a mobile app in both countries. It registers separate sender IDs per country for OTP and alerts, and another for marketing. OTP and card alerts use plain GSM-7 French of 73 and 89 characters. The marketing team sends only to customers who opted in during account opening, stores the timestamp, and adds STOP wording. Its template review caught the word "reçu", which turned a 73-character alert into two Unicode parts, and replaced it. The app sends push first and SMS if a critical alert goes unread; read channel fallback strategy for the pattern.

What are the common mistakes?

• Typing "ç", "ô" or curly apostrophes in French copy and doubling cost without noticing.
• Using one sender ID for OTP and marketing.
• Treating Togo or Benin as the same market as Côte d'Ivoire.
• Skipping network-by-network testing.
• Storing consent without a timestamp and source, when records must be kept for 12 months and produced on request.
• Ignoring number portability when you segment by operator.

How OmniChannels.ai helps

OmniChannels.ai sends A2P SMS over BroadNet's direct operator connectivity, with two-way SMS, HLR lookup, Unicode support and scheduling. Our team prepares and files sender ID registrations with you, and channel fallback is configured per use case. See the SMS price pages for Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal, our SMS channel, or book a demo to plan a pilot.