Pause and reactivate the seller
The three ways to pause the seller (general, by channel and by chat), what happens to messages while it is paused and how to make it reply again.
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Three ways to pause
General pause
Stops the seller in every conversation and channel.
Turned on by hand, by you or your team
Comes back when you activate the seller
Pause by channel
Stops the seller on one of your channels. The others keep replying.
Turned on by hand, per channel
Comes back when you turn that channel back on
Pause by chat
Stops the seller in a single conversation. The rest carries on.
Turned on by hand or for an automatic reason
Comes back by the resume rule
What pauses a conversation and when it comes back
Reasons a conversation pauses:
- Manual pause: set by you or your team; always available
- On human handoff: the seller hands the query to your team
- On registered sale: your team follows up after the sale
- Replying from your phone: your team replies from the WhatsApp Business or TikTok app
- On importing your history: customers from your earlier chats
Resume rules:
- When the customer writes again: the seller replies in their next conversation
- Never (manual only): stays paused until someone lifts it
What happens while it is paused
Messages that arrive while the seller is paused are not answered later, except in a pause for lack of WhatsApp balance. To pick up again, the customer has to write again.
While the seller is paused you can type, use Attach files or record and tap Send audio from the chat in Conversations. If the seller is still replying in that conversation, it pauses when you send your message. If the pause is due to a lack of WhatsApp balance, your message is not sent until you top up.
Each channel has its own window to reply freely after the customer’s last message: 24 hours on WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger, and 48 hours on TikTok. When the window closes, the panel does not let you write freely in that chat until the customer writes again. Telegram and Web chat have no such window.
Reactivate the seller
Activating the seller keeps the pauses your team set on specific conversations, manually or by rules. That is why some conversations may stay unanswered after you activate it.
To also remove the pauses on conversations, choose Reactivate these chats too and confirm. If you cancel, the pauses stay.
Reactivating conversations does not remove every block: billing, migration and channel blocks stay in place.
Conversations from your WhatsApp history
Conversations brought in by your WhatsApp history, from customers in your earlier chats who did not have a conversation yet, arrive paused with Paused by WhatsApp history: the seller does not know what you talked about before, so your team handles them. The seller only replies again when you remove the pause on the conversation or choose Also reactivate paused conversations. Conversations you already had do not change. In Pauses and reactivation you can choose to have them arrive active.
Paused for lack of WhatsApp balance
If the seller in a conversation is paused for lack of WhatsApp balance and the customer wrote last, the chat shows This customer is waiting for a reply and a Top up balance button instead of the text box, while the 24-hour window is still open.
When you top up your WhatsApp balance, or your monthly free replies renew, the seller replies on WhatsApp again and answers the messages left unanswered during the pause, if the customer wrote within the last 24 hours. If that conversation has another pause, such as a manual pause, it stays paused. After 24 hours, the customer has to write again.
Paused for pending payment
If the payment for your plan, a conversation package or your extra conversations is pending, the panel warns you to pay by a date or your seller will be paused. If you do not pay in time, your account is suspended for unpaid invoices: the seller and outgoing messages pause, and conversations show Paused for pending payment. It replies again once you pay; if you do not, your plan is cancelled automatically.
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