WhatsApp SLA tracking for a sales team, on the phones it already uses.

The reply SLA

You set one number: how many working hours a customer may wait for a reply. The clock starts at the customer's message and stops at the rep's reply. A rep who opens the chat and closes it again has not replied. Hours outside the working day you set are not counted, so an overnight message is not a twelve-hour failure.

From there, SLA attainment is the share of waits answered inside the SLA. It sits beside median first reply on the dashboard, per rep and for the team, with a trend. The two numbers disagree usefully: a median can hold steady while the share inside the SLA falls, because the slow replies are getting slower. Both are defined, with the working-hours rule, in the metrics guide. Response tracking is the screen for the median; the queue is where the waits past the SLA land, oldest first.

One customer, one wait

A customer who writes to a group that 3 of your numbers are in is one customer waiting, not 3. The queue raises one item for the conversation, and it closes the moment anyone on your side answers, from any linked number. The per-rep figures are stricter: they still show which rep's own reply never came. A WhatsApp call to the customer that connects counts as an answer too, because it is one: call tracking exists so a rep who picks up the phone no longer looks silent.

Deadline rules: an SLA for what was promised

Most of what slips in a sales conversation is not the first reply. It is the quote the rep said they would send, the documents the customer asked for, the options promised by tomorrow. There is no message to be late on, so a reply SLA never sees it. A deadline rule does.

A rule is a clock, an expectation and a window. The clock starts when a chat opens, when the customer says certain words, or when the rep does. The expectation is what should be said, by whom, and how many times. The window is how long it may take, on the wall clock or on working hours. Some that teams write:

• A customer asks about price, fees or cost, and the rep sends a figure within 2 working hours.
• A rep says "I will send" or "brochure", and a PDF or brochure follows within 24 hours.
• A new one-to-one chat starts, and the rep asks the qualifying question within 1 hour.
• A customer mentions a visa, and the rep lists the documents needed within 1 day.

Each rule keeps its own ledger over the last 30 days: how many clocks started, how many were met on time, met late, are still overdue or are still running, the on-time rate, and the median and p90 time it took. A new rule can be told to check the chats you already have, up to 30 days back, so it has a number on its first day rather than its thirtieth.

Reading it fairly

An SLA figure is about customers first and reps second. A rep with a low share inside the SLA may be slow, or may be carrying twice the conversations of anyone else, which is why team performance puts workload in the same table. The honest use of the number is to find the waits, then ask why. Your team should know what is measured and why; what your employer can and cannot see is written for them.

What this does not do

• It does not reply, remind a customer, or send anything from a linked number. Nothing in the product ever messages a customer.
• It does not route leads or move a chat to another rep. Reps keep their own numbers.
• It sees WhatsApp messages and calls on linked company numbers only. A reply by email or an ordinary phone call is not seen, so the wait stays open.
• It judges timing and words, not quality. A fast reply that answers nothing is still inside the SLA.
• It measures from the moment a number is linked. A deadline rule can look back up to 30 days, never further.
• It counts only what was captured. If a linked number drops, the reliability page says what is missed and how it is caught up.