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Why does a welcome message get sent if I text first?#

Sometimes WhatsApp Business users encounter an unexpected situation: they text a customer first, but immediately after, a welcome message is automatically sent on behalf of the company. Why does this happen?

What is a greeting message?#

A Greeting message is a custom message that is automatically sent to your customers when they first contact you.

Greeting messages are also sent when customers text you after 14 days of inactivity.

Important!

The message will be sent even if the message was sent by you.

If the number is registered in WhatsApp Business, and the application has an automatic greeting message set up, then such a message can be sent automatically, even if the first message was written by a user.

greeting

How ​​to set up a greeting message in WhatsApp Business?#

  1. Open WhatsApp Business on your phone
  2. Tap "Business tools" > "Greeting message"
  3. Turn on the "Send greeting message" switch
  4. In the field below, write the text of the automatic reply

    For example: "Hello! Thank you for choosing us. We will contact you soon!"

  5. Below you can choose who exactly to send the greeting message to:
    • Everyone
      allows you to send a message to everyone who sent you a message
    • Everyone not in address book
      allows you to send a message to customers whose numbers are not saved in your address book
    • Everyone except…
      allows you to send a message to all customers except the ones you select
    • Only send to
      allows you to send a message only to the customers you select
  6. Click "Save"

settingmessage

When does the automatic greeting work?#

  1. If you send the first message to a number with which you have not yet corresponded
  2. If you write to an old chat where the last message was sent more than 14 days ago

In these situations, WhatsApp Business treats the contact as a new one, and the configured welcome message is automatically triggered.

The automatic welcome is sent:

  • When using WhatsApp Web (in a browser)
  • When sending messages via GREEN-API or other integrations

In these cases, the welcome message is sent after your message and looks like it came from the company, although it was the company that initiated the communication.

Is it possible to avoid sending a welcome message?#

The sending action is to send a message from a phone.

If the message is sent directly from a phone on which WhatsApp Business is installed, the auto-reply usually does not work.
This allows employees to conduct a conversation without unnecessary automatic messages.

Is it possible to disable the welcome message when sending messages via API?#

WhatsApp does not provide an option to directly exclude sending a welcome message when using the integration.

You can change the sending options, for example, choosing not to send a message to a chat with contacts. This way, you can limit sending to chats of current clients.