A2P 10DLC Registration for Non-US Businesses | Canada, UK, Australia
If you're sending SMS to US phone numbers through GoHighLevel, your business location does not exempt you from A2P requirements. A2P 10DLC for non-US businesses is required when messages are sent to US numbers using a 10-digit long code, whether your company is based in Canada, the UK, Australia, Pakistan, or anywhere else.
The problem is that many international businesses and agencies only discover this requirement after their SMS workflows stop delivering messages. Your automations may continue running, contacts may show that messages were sent, and everything inside GoHighLevel may appear to be working—while your customers receive nothing.
In this guide, you'll learn how A2P registration outside the US works, which registration route applies to your business, and what identifiers you need to register successfully. We’ll cover the Canada BN9, UK company number, Australia ACN, sole proprietor registration, toll-free verification, and the best option for agencies managing SMS campaigns for US clients.
What is A2P 10DLC?
A2P 10DLC is the registration system United States carriers use for application to person messaging sent from standard 10 digit phone numbers. A2P means the message is sent by software rather than typed by a person. 10DLC refers to the ordinary 10 digit local number your messages come from.
Carriers introduced it to stop unregistered bulk messaging. In practice it means two things must be registered and approved before your SMS is allowed through: a brand, which is your business identity, and a campaign, which describes the kind of messages you intend to send.
Why it applies to businesses outside the United States
This is the point that trips up most international agencies. A2P 10DLC is a rule about destination, not origin.
If a message from your Go High Level account arrives at a US phone number, US carriers handle the final delivery, and their rules apply to it. Your company country of registration is irrelevant to that decision. A Manchester agency messaging Manchester customers is in a different position to a Manchester agency messaging customers in Denver.
So the test is simple. Ask yourself one question: does any workflow in this sub account send SMS to a US number? If yes, you need to register.
What happens if you never register
Since 31 August 2023, unregistered traffic to US numbers is blocked. This was the point at which carriers stopped filtering unregistered messages and began rejecting them entirely.
The practical result is the silent failure described above. Your automations continue to fire, your account shows activity, and delivery does not happen. There is no grace period remaining and no volume small enough to slip through.
Which registration route applies to you?
Before going further, find yourself in this table. The rest of the article is organised in the same order.
Your situation
Route
What you get
You have an official company or tax identifier in your country
Route 1: Standard registration
Full throughput, multiple campaigns and numbers
No tax ID, but a valid business address in the US or Canada
Route 2: Sole proprietor
Registration, but capped at 1 message per second, one campaign, one number
No tax ID and no US or Canada address
Route 3: Toll free
A different messaging path with its own verification
There is a fourth option that applies specifically to agencies, covered under Route 3, and for many offshore agencies it is the correct answer rather than a fallback.
Route 1: Register with your local company identifier
This is the standard path and the one to aim for, because it gives you full message throughput and the ability to run multiple campaigns across multiple numbers.
You do not need a US EIN. You register using the official company identifier issued by your own national authority. HighLevel documents examples for the three most common cases.
Canada: the BN9 Business Number
Canadian businesses register using the BN9, the nine digit Business Number issued by the Canada Revenue Agency. Use the number exactly as issued, with the legal entity name it is registered against, not your operating or trading name.
United Kingdom: the Companies House company number
UK businesses use the company number issued by Companies House. This is the number on your certificate of incorporation. Your registered office address is the one on the public register, which is frequently your accountant’s address rather than where you actually work. Submit the registered address, not the working one.
Australia: the ASIC company number
Australian businesses use the ACN, the company number issued by ASIC. If your business also has an ABN, note that these are different numbers and the submission expects the company registration identifier.
Other countries
Trust Center indicates which identifier it accepts for your country. The underlying requirement is consistent everywhere: an official, verifiable registration number issued by a national authority, matching a legal entity name and registered address exactly as they appear on the public record.
If your country issues a company registration number that can be checked against a public register, you will generally be able to complete Route 1.
The mistake that fails most non-US brand submissions
Vetting compares what you typed against public company records. It is a matching exercise, and it is unforgiving.
Three specific mismatches account for the majority of failures:
Trading name instead of legal name. “Bright Digital” is not “Bright Digital Marketing Ltd”. The suffix matters.
Current address instead of registered address. You moved office. The register did not.
Formatting of the identifier. Spaces, dashes and leading zeros are not decoration. Copy the number exactly as issued.
Before you submit anything, open your official company record in another tab and copy from it directly. Do not type from memory, and do not trust the version saved in your CRM. This single habit prevents most rejections.
Route 2: Sole proprietor registration without a tax ID
If your business has no tax identification number but does have a valid business address in the United States or Canada, there is a second path: sole proprietor registration.
Who qualifies
The eligibility rules are narrow and worth reading carefully, because one of them is counterintuitive:
You must not have a tax ID. Having one makes you ineligible for this route and sends you back to Route 1. This surprises people who assume more documentation is always better.
A valid business address in the US or Canada. No other country qualifies for this route.
One employee. It is designed for individuals, not teams.
Identity confirmed by one time password sent to a mobile number.
That mobile cannot be a number from a CPaaS provider such as LeadConnector or Twilio. It has to be a real personal or business mobile.
The same mobile cannot be reused across more than three A2P registrations.
What sole proprietor registration costs
HighLevel publishes the sole proprietor fees separately from standard registration. At the time of writing they are a one time brand registration fee of $4.41, a one time campaign vetting fee of $16.54, and a monthly campaign fee of $2.21.
These are carrier and registry costs passed through rather than platform charges, and they can change. Check the current figures in your own account before quoting them to a client.
When this route is the wrong choice
Choose Route 1 instead if any of these are true: you send to more than a few hundred contacts at a time, you run more than one type of campaign, you need more than one sending number, or you are an agency operating on behalf of clients.
Sole proprietor registration suits a single consultant confirming bookings. It does not suit a business running marketing at volume.
Route 3: Toll free verification when neither route works
If you have no tax identification number and no business address in the US or Canada, standard A2P 10DLC brand registration is not available to you. This is the position many agencies in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa find themselves in while serving US clients.
How toll free differs from 10DLC
A toll free number is a separate messaging path. It carries its own verification process, and it is not governed by 10DLC brand and campaign registration. For a business that cannot satisfy either of the first two routes, it is the workable option.
Toll free verification still assesses your use case, your consent mechanism and your message content. It is a different process, not an easier one, and it should not be treated as a way around the rules.
The option most offshore agencies should use instead
There is a fourth approach that is usually the right one, and it is not really a fallback at all.
Register each client under their own legal entity.
If you are an agency in Karachi building GoHighLevel systems for a plumbing company in Phoenix, the brand being registered should be the plumbing company. Their EIN. Their legal name. Their registered address. You do the technical work and submit on their behalf, but the entity on record is the business whose customers are receiving the messages.
This is both the compliant arrangement and the one that passes vetting, for the same underlying reason: carriers want the business sending the messages to be the business identified in the registration. It also removes your throughput ceiling entirely, because each client registers as a standard brand in their own right.
What you need before you submit
Prepare all of this before starting, not halfway through. A part completed submission that times out is indistinguishable from a rejected one in terms of lost time.
Business details
Legal entity name, exactly as registered
Company or tax identification number, formatted exactly as issued
Registered business address as it appears on the public register
Business email on your own domain, not a free mailbox
Business website that is live and reachable
Your website
This is the requirement most people underestimate. A reviewer will open your website and look for the consent mechanism. If they cannot find it, the campaign fails regardless of how accurate your paperwork is.
Your site needs a form that collects phone numbers with an explicit SMS consent checkbox that is not pre ticked and not bundled with other agreements. The wording should state who is messaging, roughly how often, that message and data rates may apply, and how to opt out.
Your privacy policy
Your privacy policy needs a clause stating that mobile numbers are not sold or shared with third parties for marketing purposes. Its absence is one of the most common silent failures, because nothing about your submission looks wrong. The reviewer simply checks the policy, does not find the clause, and rejects.
Your sample messages
Sample messages must match the use case you registered, include your business name, and contain clear opt out wording. Placeholder text will fail. Write the messages you actually intend to send.
How to register A2P in GoHighLevel, step by step
Confirm which route applies using the table earlier in this article.
Fix your website and privacy policy first. Do this before submitting anything, because both are checked during campaign review and neither is quick to change afterwards.
OpenTrust Center in the relevant sub account.
Submit the brand using your legal entity details copied directly from your official company record.
Wait for the brand result before submitting the campaign. Submitting both blindly means a brand rejection wastes the campaign attempt too.
Submit the campaign with a specific use case, matching sample messages and an accurate description of how contacts opt in.
Link your phone number to the approved campaign.
Send a real test message to a US number you control and confirm it arrives. Approval status alone is not proof of delivery.
Why non-US registrations get rejected
Rejection is common and recoverable. What matters is reading the actual vetting error rather than resubmitting the same information and hoping for a different result.
Non-US submissions tend to fail for three reasons specifically.
The entity name does not match the public record. Fix: pull your certificate of incorporation or public register entry and copy the legal name character for character, including the suffix.
The identifier is formatted incorrectly for that country. Fix: check whether your country’s identifier includes leading zeros, spaces or a prefix, and reproduce it exactly.
The website does not show the consent flow the campaign describes. Fix: add the SMS consent checkbox and the privacy policy clause, publish the changes, confirm the page is live, and only then resubmit.
How long does A2P registration take?
Timelines are set by the carriers and the registry, not by HighLevel and not by your agency. Brand checks generally resolve faster than campaign vetting, and both vary.
Anyone promising a specific number of days is guessing. What genuinely changes your timeline is whether the first submission passes, because every rejection sends you back to the start of the queue.
An hour spent checking your company record against your submission is worth more than any amount of chasing afterwards.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need A2P 10DLC if my business is not in the United States?
Yes, if you send SMS to US phone numbers from a 10 digit long code. A2P 10DLC is triggered by the destination of the message, not by where your company is registered. A UK agency messaging UK contacts is in a different situation to a UK agency messaging US contacts.
Can I register A2P in GoHighLevel from Canada, the UK or Australia?
Yes. Trust Center has accepted registrations from all countries since 4 July 2023. You use your national company identifier instead of a US EIN: the BN9 in Canada, the Companies House company number in the UK, and the ASIC ACN in Australia.
What identifier does my country use if it is not listed?
Trust Center indicates which identifier it accepts for your country. The requirement is an official registration number issued by a national authority that can be verified against a public register. If your business has no such identifier and no US or Canada address, toll free verification is the alternative.
Can I register A2P without an EIN?
Yes, through sole proprietor registration, but only if you have a business address in the US or Canada and no tax ID at all. Having a tax ID makes you ineligible for that route and requires standard registration instead.
Can an agency register A2P on behalf of its clients?
Yes, and for offshore agencies this is usually the correct approach. Each client registers as their own legal entity using their own identifier, and you handle the submission for them. The business sending the messages should be the business on record.
What happens if I never register?
Traffic to US numbers from unregistered 10DLC numbers is blocked. Since 31 August 2023 this has been enforced rather than throttled, so messages do not arrive, automations fail silently, and nothing in your account reports an error.
Is toll free verification easier than 10DLC registration?
It is a different process rather than an easier one. It does not require 10DLC brand and campaign registration, which makes it workable when you have no qualifying identifier, but it still assesses consent, use case and content.
Does one A2P registration cover all my sub accounts?
No. Each business sending SMS registers as its own entity. An agency running twenty client sub accounts needs twenty registrations, not one.
Why does my A2P brand keep getting rejected?
Almost always a mismatch between your submission and your public company record: legal name, registered address or identifier formatting. Resubmitting the same details will fail again. Correct the source data first.
What is a vetting score and why does it matter?
Vetting assesses your business and influences the message throughput you are granted. A low outcome means fewer messages per second, which usually presents as messages arriving late rather than as an obvious error.
Do I need A2P for messages to Canadian or UK numbers?
A2P 10DLC governs traffic to US numbers. Other countries have their own regulatory frameworks for commercial messaging, and your obligations there are separate from 10DLC registration.
Can I keep using my existing number after registering?
Yes. Registration links your existing 10DLC number to an approved campaign rather than replacing it. You do need to complete the link step, which is a common thing to forget after approval.
