UpChannels
Communication Hub

Every customer text answered
with the whole story on screen

One inbox for every conversation, with the customer's orders, schedule, and history beside every reply. Your team answers faster, sounds sharper, and never asks “which order was that?”

Unified inbox for all incoming & outgoing SMS messagesInitiate conversations from orders, services & customer pagesComplete customer context & order history sidebar

SMS Message Center

Auto-sync
Recent Conversations24
SJ
Sarah Johnson2m
Thanks for the HVAC service quote!
MC
Mike Chen15m
When can you schedule the repair?
LD
Lisa Davis1h
Perfect, see you tomorrow at 2pm
Hi! I received your quote for the HVAC service. Thanks for the quick response!
You're welcome! Would you like to schedule the service? We have availability tomorrow afternoon.
Type a message…
SJ
Sarah Johnson
VIP • +1 (555) 123-4567
$2,840
6 orders
Shipped today

One shared SMS inbox for the whole store, with the order history beside it

📨Unified Inbox

All messages in
one central hub.

Manage all incoming and outgoing SMS messages from a single, organized interface with conversation threading and smart sorting.

Threaded conversation view with message historySmart filtering by status, source, and priorityReal-time message synchronizationMessage read/unread status tracking
Message Center
Incoming Messages
New
Read
Priority
💬
📱
🔄
🔗Contextual Integration

Complete customer context
in the panel beside the thread.

See complete customer information and order history alongside conversations, and take action directly from the messaging interface.

Customer profile & contact details
Complete order history with details
Service history & upcoming appointments
Quick actions: create order, schedule service
Customer Context
👤
📦
🔧
Quick Actions
Create
New Order
Schedule
Service
🚀Cross-Platform Initiation

Start conversations
from anywhere.

Initiate SMS conversations directly from orders, service schedules, customer profiles, and any other area of your business platform.

Message customers from order detailsSend updates from service schedulingContact from customer profile pagesContext-aware message templates
Quick SMS, anywhere you work
1-click SMSContext awarePre-filled templates
📋
Orders & Estimates

Send quotes, delivery updates, and payment links without leaving the order.

🗓️
Schedule Board

Confirm appointments, notify “tech en route”, or reschedule in one tap.

👥
Customer Profile

Send balance reminders, thank-you + review links, or birthday promos.

🔧
Service Ticket

Update on parts arrival, job complete notices, and follow-up messages.

🧾
Invoices & Payments

Share secure pay links, receipts, and past-due nudges with one click.

📣
Campaigns & Lists

Broadcast to a filtered group or send a one-off message to a segment.

…and more — if there’s a customer phone number, you can send a quick SMS.

Templates, delivery and response rates, and consent handling — all built in

📝

Message Templates

Pre-built templates for common customer interactions and scenarios.

📊

Message Analytics

Track delivery rate and response rate.

🔐

Secure & Compliant

Enterprise-grade security with SMS compliance and data protection.

Coming soon

A store that answers at 9 p.m.

We're building the next stage of the Communication Hub: 24/7 auto and semi-automated messaging and phone answering. A customer who texts at 9 p.m. about a delivery gets a real answer at 9:01 — routine questions handled automatically, anything else queued with full context for your team in the morning, and every conversation waiting for you to read over coffee.

This is in development, not yet shipped. If you'd like your store to help shape it, tell us — early stores get it first.

Ask about early access
Common questions

Messaging questions, answered

How do I text a customer about one specific order or scheduled job?
Send from the record itself — the order, the job on the schedule board, or the customer page all have a send box that pulls the customer’s mobile number and starts or continues the thread for you. Invoices go out the same way, as do customer-portal links on Pro and Premium once the portal is switched on. The customer’s reply lands back in the Communication Hub instead of on a salesperson’s personal phone, so whoever is working the next day can read the whole exchange.
What does the hub show me about the customer while I am replying?
A panel beside every thread shows the customer’s name, every phone number and email on file, the date they became a customer, their saved addresses, and their order history — how many orders, how many items, how much they have spent, then each order with its number, date, status and total. Clicking an order opens the full order record without leaving the conversation. It reads the same customer and order records the rest of UpChannels writes to, so it is never a stale copy pasted into a separate messaging tool.
Is the Communication Hub included in the Basic plan?
No. The Communication Hub is part of the SMS suite on the Pro and Premium plans, alongside SMS campaigns and triggered texts from orders, schedules and customer records. Pro includes 500 outbound messages per month and Premium includes 2,000; replies your customers send in are free and do not count against either allowance. If you need more volume than that, ask us and we will size a plan to it. Compare the plans.
Do my customers text a new number, or the store line I already have?
Plans that include SMS come with a dedicated phone number for your store, and the UpChannels team provisions it with you rather than leaving you to configure a carrier account. Calls placed to that number are forwarded to your existing store line, so a customer who texts and then calls still reaches the same people. Your current phone line keeps working exactly as it does today.
What happens if I text a customer who has not opted in to SMS?
UpChannels stops the send and asks you to confirm the customer agreed to receive texts from your store. Confirming records that opt-in on the customer record and sends the message; cancelling leaves the record untouched and nothing goes out. If the customer has actually replied STOP at some point, the carrier blocks delivery no matter what you confirm in the app until they text START — that backstop lives at the carrier and the software cannot override it.
Can I send and receive photos, not just plain text?
Yes — picture messaging works in both directions. You can attach up to 10 JPEG, PNG or GIF images to one message, each compressed before it is sent and capped at 5 MB. Photos a customer sends you, such as a model-number plate on the back of a dryer or a damaged panel on a delivered sofa, appear inline in the thread and open full size, which is usually faster than asking them to email it.
Does UpChannels answer texts for me after hours?
Not yet. Today a person on your team writes every reply — the hub makes them faster by putting the order history, addresses and past conversation on the same screen, but it does not answer on its own. Automatic and semi-automatic 24/7 answering is in development and has not shipped; if you want your store in the early group, tell us and we will include you when it does.

Communication Hub is one part of UpChannels

The UpChannels Communication Hub is a shared SMS and picture-messaging inbox for small retailers and service businesses — plumbing, cleaning and tree-care crews, gift, clothing and furniture stores — that shows the customer's phone numbers, addresses and full order history in a panel beside every thread. Staff text customers straight from an order, a job on the schedule board, an invoice or a customer record, and the replies come back into the same thread rather than a personal phone. It is included on the Pro and Premium plans, which come with a dedicated store phone number that forwards calls to your existing line; 24/7 automatic answering is in development and not yet shipped.

UpChannels is an all-in-one platform for small retailers and service businesses — sales, inventory, customers, scheduling, delivery, payments and finance in one system — and a real team that builds your website, runs your ads, and automates the busywork. Every capability below is included in the same subscription, with no integration to wire up between them.

See plans and pricingEverything the software doesSetups by business type

Works with

The product moves faster than this page. UpChannels ships updates most weeks, so a description here can lag what is already in the software. Where the two disagree, the running product is the current version — tell us if you find one and we will correct the page.

Ready to upgrade your
retail business management?

Start your free trial today. No credit card required.

Start free trialSchedule a demo
Free 14-day trial
No setup fees
Cancel anytime

One system for the counter, the schedule, the truck and the books — and a team that will build the website, run the ads and take the busywork off you if you would rather not do it yourself. Start with the trial, or have us walk you through it first.

UpChannels