Outbound batch call error for US numbers despite valid E.164 formatting

Support Help
1

Hello Retell team,

We’re running into a persistent issue with batch outbound calls, even after strictly following the official CSV template and formatting guidelines.

Problem
After uploading recipients, we consistently get errors such as:

  • “Country is not in the allowed outbound country list for this phone number.”

  • “The number provided is not a valid number. Please provide a valid number in E.164 format.”

What we’ve already verified

  • All recipients are United States numbers only

  • All numbers are formatted correctly in E.164 (+1XXXXXXXXXX)

  • We used the official Retell CSV template without changing headers

  • ignore e164 validation set correctly

  • Tested multiple CSV files (large and very small batches)

  • Tested with a single known-valid US number

  • Issue still occurs consistently

From Number
+16677779782

At this point, it seems like the issue may be related to:

  • Outbound country allowlist not including United States

  • Account-level or phone-number-level outbound restrictions

  • Pending verification / compliance gating

Could someone from the Retell team please help confirm:

  1. Whether US outbound calling is enabled for our account and From Number

  2. If there are any allowlist, compliance, or verification blocks

  3. Any additional steps required to enable US batch outbound calls

We’ve attached screenshots showing the exact errors for reference.

Thanks in advance — any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

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Make an Outbound Call... does nothing
2

Based on the errors you’re encountering, here are the key areas to verify:

Check Your Phone Number’s Outbound Country Settings

Your phone number +16677779782 needs to have the United States explicitly included in its outbound_allowed_countries list(1)(2). You can verify this by retrieving your phone number details using the Get Phone Number API(2).

If outbound_allowed_countries is null or empty, calls to all countries are allowed(1)(2). However, if it contains a list of countries and “US” is not included, you’ll get the country restriction error(1)(2).

Verify E.164 Format Requirements

For batch calls, ensure your CSV follows these requirements(3):

  • Phone numbers must be in E.164 format (+1XXXXXXXXXX for US numbers)(3)
  • The CSV must include a header row with a “phone number” column(3)
  • If using custom telephony and needing to bypass E.164 validation, add a column named ignore e164 validation with value true(3)

Common Formatting Issues

Based on community reports, the most frequent cause of “invalid number” errors is incorrect formatting - specifically including dashes or spaces in phone numbers(4). Even if you believe your format is correct, double-check that there are absolutely no dashes, spaces, or other characters in your phone number column(4).

Next Steps

  1. Use the Get Phone Number API to retrieve your number’s configuration and verify the outbound_allowed_countries setting(2)
  2. If US is not in the list (and the list is not null/empty), you’ll need to update your phone number configuration to include “US”(1)(2)
  3. Re-verify your CSV has no hidden formatting issues (open in a plain text editor to confirm)

If after these checks the issue persists, please reach out through official support channels:

3

Hello @johnstevenson
As you can see the number +11444524636 is not a valid phone number , that’s why it show you this error ,
please remove it and try again.