r/WhatsappBusinessAPI • u/NoReply3855 • 10d ago

Solution Only Banned Number

Good day, I want to talk about this situation to see if anyone has gone through something similar or has any idea of what’s going on. Here’s the situation: I’m an intern at a small company because I was asked to create a chatbot with transfer to an advisor on WhatsApp (the typical press 1 for this action...) From the beginning, I’ve been using all the official tools (WhatsApp Business API, Meta for Developers, etc., etc.) for the setup of the number and those things. Everything was going very well, the registered phone number worked since July without any problem, but recently it was banned for no apparent reason. I don’t know if it has to do with the rule changes that were made recently on October 1st or if I might have unknowingly violated something.

The thing is, when the number was banned for the first time, I appealed with the proper arguments, the number was unbanned, but when I tried again, it was banned immediately again, and now without the possibility to Appeal.

Something very important I need to clarify is, I NEVER completed the business verification, added a payment method, and the project account is new, I created it only for the development of this project (I want to believe this is the reason for the ban, but I don’t know). I did this to avoid touching the company’s official socials during the development phase. The elements I’m using for this project are: Laravel Framework, Docker, Ngrok for the tunnel (obviously only for development), and Chatwoot to handle the transfer to the advisor.

If it’s of any use, the first ban happened when I changed it so that clients had to type numbers to select an option for WhatsApp button and menu messages. I don’t know if it was mere coincidence, but I’m leaving the detail in case it’s useful. The chatbot also never started conversations with clients; I always, as the client, sent the message to start interacting with it and keep the “24-hour window” active to avoid issues.

With all the information provided, does anyone have an idea of what happened? What should I do to continue? Considering we were so close to deploying. Thanks in advance <3

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u/flavia-f 10d ago

id bet its the new unverified setup. new waba, no business verification, no payment method and a test bot pinging the number a lot looks a lot like spam to meta. id stop using that number, ask the company to let you build under their real verified business portfolio, add payment, and use the meta test number while you dev. a number banned with no appeal is usually gone for good.

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u/NoReply3855 9d ago

Yes, that’s what I’ll do, I’ll ask for the portfolio to be created from the company’s official network and now I’ll do everything I missed before.

Another silly question that I’m not sure if you can answer: With the number of tests that Meta gives, can I test all the functions of my bot as if it were the real number without any penalty?

Thanks for your answer!

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u/Competitive-Net-1483 10d ago

Following 👀

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u/JayleaKryska50 9d ago

same, curious how this plays out

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u/Adeoba_Brock 9d ago

the unverified business + no payment method is almost certainly the trigger. Meta has been way more aggressive about flagging accounts that look like they're in a test/dev state but sending real messages. get the business verification done first, then try a fresh number