Sending and the 24-hour window

You can reply to a client on WhatsApp straight from KretaOS. The message goes out from your company's number or your own, and is logged on the client's page. WhatsApp has one rule every business must follow: their 24-hour reply window.

Their 24-hour reply window

WhatsApp lets a business send any message it likes within 24 hours of the client's last message to that number. After 24 hours, or if the client has never written to that number, the business can only start with a template that WhatsApp has approved in advance.

The window is counted per client and per number. If a client wrote to your own number this morning, your window there is open, even if the company number has not heard from them in a week. A reply you typed on your phone does not open the window; only the client's message does.

Send a message

1. Open Inbox, pick the client's conversation, choose the person and switch the composer to WhatsApp.
2. Check the line above the text box:
   • "Reply window open until 5:30 PM": write freely, or press AI Draft.
   • "Their 24-hour reply window has closed": pick a template from the Pick a template menu and fill in its blanks. See WhatsApp templates.
3. Press Send.

Which number it goes from

KretaOS picks the number for you:

1. the number this client last chatted on, if you can use it
2. otherwise your own number, if you connected one
3. otherwise a team number you can use

If you can send from more than one, a From menu lets you choose. You can only send on a team number whose access list you are on.

After you send

The message is logged on the client's timeline, their last contact moves, and a follow-up task "Follow up with name — no reply to WhatsApp" is set. When the client replies on WhatsApp, that task closes by itself.

When you cannot send

• No number connected. The composer shows Connect WhatsApp to send · Log it instead. Log the chat you had on your phone instead. See Log a chat by hand.
• Held. The same checks as email apply: that they have not opted out of WhatsApp, their quiet hours and the daily limit. If one fails, nothing is sent and KretaOS tells you why. See Why a send was held.

Good to know

• Files go as a link the client can open.
• Automations send WhatsApp only from a team number, never from someone's own phone number.
• No AI credits are used to send. WhatsApp bills template messages to your WhatsApp Business account.