Answering “where is my order” on WhatsApp, within Meta’s rules

Meta’s Business Messaging Policy permits automation inside the 24-hour window, with a condition: you must also have “prompt, clear, and direct escalation paths” available — an in-chat human transfer, phone number, email, web support, in-store visit or support form. An AI agent with no way out of it is not a grey area. It is the one rule on this page that a chatbot deployment most often fails.

Why WISMO is the thing you automate first

Where-is-my-order runs at 25–40% of ecommerce support volume, climbing past 50% in peak season. It is repetitive, it is answerable from data you already hold, and the customer wants a fact rather than a conversation. If anything in your support queue should be answered by software, it is this.

It is also the category where automation goes wrong most visibly, because the customer is already anxious. A bot that cannot find the order and cannot pass them to anyone turns a delivery delay into a complaint about you.

The four rules that govern an automated WISMO reply

1. Opt-in, with no category exemption

The policy states one condition for contacting anyone: they gave you their number, and they gave you opt-in permission confirming they want messages from you.

There is a widely repeated claim that utility templates — order confirmations, shipping updates — need no opt-in because they are transactional. That confuses two different things. Template approval is Meta agreeing the message is what it says it is. Opt-in is the customer agreeing to hear from you. Utility templates get easier approval. They do not get an exemption from permission.

Meta’s own best-practice guidance goes further and suggests opt-in per message category, so someone can accept delivery updates without accepting offers.

2. The window runs from their last message, not their first

You may reply freely for 24 hours after the customer’s most recent message. Every new message they send moves the deadline forward. Outside the window, approved templates only.

This matters for WISMO specifically because these threads go quiet and restart. A customer asks on Monday, you answer, they reply on Wednesday when the parcel still has not arrived — that reply opens a fresh window. Your agent does not need a template to answer it.

3. Automation is allowed, but only with a way out

This is the rule worth checking your own setup against tonight. Automation inside the window is explicitly permitted. It is permitted on the condition that a prompt, clear and direct escalation path is available.

Which means a bot that answers “I’m sorry, I didn’t understand that” three times and offers nothing else is not merely a poor experience. It is outside the terms you agreed to when you connected the number.

In practice, an escalation path has to be reachable when the customer wants it and not only when the bot decides. Working out that a person is asking for a human is the agent’s job, not the customer’s.

4. Opt-out is immediate and absolute

You must respect any request to stop, on or off WhatsApp. Not at the end of the sequence, not after one more message. The policy also forbids sharing information from one customer’s chat with another customer, which is worth knowing if you were considering routing threads between people.

Where the money goes after 1 October

Service messages become billable on 1 October 2026, which changes the arithmetic of WISMO more than any other category, because WISMO is answered almost entirely with service messages.

Two paths to the same answer, priced differently:

The proactive route is billed too, but it carries a volume tier and it can prevent the thread entirely. The reactive route is flat-rate however much you send. Once the rates are published, that comparison is worth doing with your own numbers rather than assuming either is cheaper.

What a compliant automated WISMO thread looks like

• The customer opted in when they gave their number at checkout, to a notice that said what they would receive.
• They message first, which opens the window. No template needed for anything that follows in the next 24 hours.
• The agent identifies the order from the number, the order reference, or by asking for one thing rather than five.
• It answers with a fact — carrier, status, expected date — instead of a link to a tracking page they have already refreshed twice.
• A human is one message away, offered when the agent cannot answer and reachable whenever the customer asks.
• Stop means stop, immediately, and it applies to future campaigns too.

The failure that gets accounts restricted

Meta limits how much a business can send when its quality tier stays low, and quality tier is driven by blocks and reports. Almost nobody blocks a business for answering their question with software. People block businesses for messaging them without permission, and for not stopping when asked.

Which is the useful thing to take from all of this: the automation is not the risk. The permission is.

Common questions

Published 11 August 2026. Quotations are from the WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy, last updated 1 May 2026. Meta may change this policy without notice — check the source before relying on it.