WhatsApp Business app. The free app with the B on the icon. Different from ordinary WhatsApp, and the only one a number can be connected from while staying on the phone.
WhatsApp Business account. Meta’s record of your business on WhatsApp. It holds your number, your templates and your payment method. Sometimes written WABA.
WhatsApp Business Platform, or Cloud API. The official way for a business system like ServiceM8 to send and receive WhatsApp messages. Everything the add-on does goes through it.
Coexistence, or “keep my app”. Connecting a number to the platform while it stays on the WhatsApp Business app on a phone. Messages sync both ways.
Registered. WhatsApp is passing messages for the number to the platform. Different from connected, which only means we hold your account.
The window, or the 24-hour rule. The 24 hours after a customer’s message in which you can reply freely. Outside it, templates only.
Template. A message WhatsApp has approved in advance, for sending outside the window. Mirrored from your ServiceM8 SMS templates.
Merge field. A placeholder in a template, like the customer’s first name, filled in from the job when sent.
Utility and marketing. WhatsApp’s two categories of template. Utility is about a job the customer already has; marketing is promotional and costs more.
Inbox. ServiceM8’s Inbox, where new enquiries land from every channel, including WhatsApp. Needed for the add-on.
Dispatch board. ServiceM8’s schedule of who is doing what and when. The booking assistant puts bookings on it.
Allocation windows. ServiceM8’s own booking windows, if you have set them up. The booking assistant can offer them instead of morning and afternoon.
Job template. A ServiceM8 template a job can be made from, carrying its badges, checklist and line items. The booking assistant can make a service from one.
Chat Assistant. The add-on’s AI tier: drafts you send, and the booking assistant that answers new enquiries.
Credit. One unit of the Chat Assistant’s monthly allowance. One per draft, one per message the assistant has to read.
Linked device. A computer, tablet or watch signed in to a WhatsApp account. The connection to ServiceM8 is one too, which is why WhatsApp’s rules for linked devices apply to it.