The shared inbox and the 24-hour window
How chats reach an agent, what the 24-hour rule means, and when you must use a template.
Every customer conversation on your number lands in one shared inbox, filtered by All, Assigned to me, Unassigned, Priority and Closed.
The 24-hour customer service window
WhatsApp lets you reply in free text only within 24 hours of the customer’s last message. The clock restarts every time they write. While it is open, the inbox shows a countdown and you can type anything.
Once it closes, the thread says “Session closed · only an approved template can be sent now” and the composer offers “Choose a template” instead of a text box. This is WhatsApp’s rule, not ours, and there is no way around it — the customer has to write to you again to reopen the window.
Who gets a new chat
Settings → Assignment decides what happens when a new customer messages. Four options:
| Strategy | What it does |
|---|---|
| Round robin | Hands each new chat to the next agent in turn. This is the default. |
| Least busy | Sends it to whoever has the fewest open chats. |
| Offer to everyone | First agent to accept takes it. |
| Manual only | Leaves new chats unassigned for agents to claim. |
Only agents who are online and under their chat limit are ever offered a chat, and assignment happens on a customer’s first message or when a closed chat reopens — never mid-conversation. If nobody is available, the chat waits in Unassigned rather than being dropped.
First reply target
You can set a target for how fast a new message gets a human reply. Agents then see a countdown on every waiting chat, amber in the last few minutes and red once it is missed, and you choose what happens when the owner misses it.
Saved replies
Type “/” in the composer to pull up saved replies. A reply can be personal to you or shared with the team (shown with a “Team” pill), and picking one fills the box so you can edit it before sending.
Roles and what each one can doWho can see which chats.More in Inbox and team
- Roles and what each one can do — The five built-in roles, and what “own conversations only” really means.