WhatsApp automation, and what Meta charges for it

Two products, not one

Almost everything sold as WhatsApp automation is one of two different things, and the gap between the prices below is the difference between them, not an upsell.

The WhatsApp Business app is free software that runs on a phone. It gives you a business profile, a greeting message, an away message, saved quick replies, labels to sort chats, and a product catalogue. Meta charges nothing per message. What it cannot do is send an enquiry to a particular person, run a chatbot, or connect to your website and your records. It is one phone, answered by whoever is holding it.

Its broadcast lists are also narrower than they sound. A broadcast reaches only those people who have already saved your number in their own phone, and each list is capped at 256 recipients. It is a way to reach your regulars, not a way to reach a market. The catalogue in that package is loaded with the first ten products you send us — a picture, a name and a price for each — so the format and the photographs are set; after that you add them yourself in the app, which needs no technical skill, or we quote for loading the rest by the number of items.

The WhatsApp Cloud API is Meta’s system for businesses that need the things the app cannot do. It is a real integration, it does not work until Meta approves your business, and Meta charges you for the messages you send. The other two packages are built on it.

What Meta requires before the API works

• A Meta Business Manager account in your business’s name, and business verification. Meta asks for documents — a registration certificate, a GST certificate, a utility bill.
• A phone number not currently in use on WhatsApp or the WhatsApp Business app. Moving an existing number means deleting that account first, and its chat history does not come across.
• A display name that Meta approves.
• Every message that starts a conversation written as a template and approved before it can be sent. Templates get rejected and rewritten. That is normal, not a mistake.

None of this is ours to hurry. We prepare the submissions and tell you exactly what is being asked for, but Meta decides and Meta sets the pace, so we do not promise you a date. Where you can, upload your documents to Meta yourself — the fewer copies of your business papers in circulation, the better. Catalogue items are reviewed against Meta’s commerce policy too, and can be rejected.

Meta charges for messages, and the bill is yours

This is the part most often left out of a quote. Sending on the Cloud API costs money, paid to Meta, from your own Meta account on your own card. It is not inside our setup price, and it is not inside the yearly price either. Those two cover our work. The messages are between you and Meta. The rate depends on the category Meta files the message under and on the country the number belongs to; some categories cost more than others, and some cost nothing. Meta has changed both the rates and the way it counts them, so no figure is printed here that would still be right in a year. Read Meta’s current rate card before you budget.

One rule shapes what any automation can do. When a customer messages you, you may reply freely for twenty-four hours afterwards. Once that window closes you can only reach them with an approved template, and the template is the message you pay for.

Our yearly price keeps the automation working: answers kept true as your prices and offers change, templates resubmitted when Meta rejects them, the quality rating watched, and the server the inbox runs on.

Broadcasts, and how numbers get banned

You may message people who opted in. That is the rule, and it is enforced by the people you message: if enough of them block or report you, your quality rating falls, Meta cuts how many people you can reach in a day, and the number can be disabled. A disabled number takes your chat history and your customers’ route to you with it. So opt-in is captured, dated and stored, and the broadcast tool sends to that list and nothing else.

Where it runs

The free Business app runs on your phone and needs nothing from us. The other two packages are software, and software has to sit on a server — the webhook Meta sends your messages to, the enquiries as they are saved, the answer book, the inbox. That server is included in the price and it is ours, so you do not need a website to buy either of them. If you already host a site with us, it runs there instead and you pay for one server, not two.

The chat assistant and the WhatsApp button on this site are our own work, and the handling behind them is what you would be buying: a message that reaches us becomes an enquiry, is checked against the numbers we already hold so one person does not appear twice, and goes to whoever has the fewest open enquiries. Send one from this page if you would rather see it working than read about it.

When not to buy the API

If every enquiry already reaches one phone and one person answers it, you do not need any of this. Set the free Business app up properly and stop there. It costs nothing, our setup for it is the cheapest thing on this page, and you could genuinely do it yourself in an evening from Meta’s own help pages — we charge for doing it quickly and completely, not for access to something locked. There is no yearly fee on that package either, because nothing of ours runs after we hand it over. The two API packages carry one for a reason you can check: templates get rejected and have to be resubmitted, Meta changes its policy, and a quality rating that starts slipping has to be noticed by somebody before the number is restricted.

Buy the API when the messages have outgrown one person: enquiries missed overnight, two people answering the same customer, or a WhatsApp thread that has to end up in the same records as everything else you track. If you are also buying our sales funnel line, say so — the Meta verification is done once and serves both.

Connecting any of this into an ERP, a CRM or billing software you already run is not inside these prices. Send the details of what you run and we will price it properly rather than guess.

What we do not do

• Bulk sender software, modified apps or unofficial APIs. They work until the number is banned, and you should not count on getting it back.
• Buy, scrape or supply phone numbers. Bring your own list and the consent behind it.
• Promise template approval, a verified green tick, or that anybody will read what you send.
• Take over a website we did not build in order to fit a button. You get the code and the link; your developer pastes it in, or we quote the change separately.
• Hold your Meta assets. The Business Manager, the WhatsApp account and the number stay in your name, and you can remove our access without asking us.