Collects as they arrive, acts daily

Get pinged when a WhatsApp customer waits over an hour

If nobody has replied to a customer within an hour, you get an alert with their number.

Runs: Collects as they arrive, acts daily
Apps: WhatsApp Business
AI: Not needed
Access: whatsapp_business_messaging

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: if a customer on our WhatsApp number has waited more than an hour without a reply, email me their number and last message.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

Add to ChatGPT Add to Claude

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

A customer writes to the business WhatsApp number at lunchtime with a question about a delivery. The team is busy, the chat slides down the list, and nobody replies. Three hours later the customer posts a bad review. Inside WhatsApp there is no timer that says a conversation has waited too long, so unanswered messages stay invisible until the customer complains publicly.

The automation notes the time of the last inbound message from each number, and clears it when an outbound message to that number is recorded. Every fifteen minutes it checks for numbers whose message has waited more than an hour, and pings you with who is waiting and since when.

It suits support desks and small shops that promise a reply within a stated time. The alert is a nudge for a human, not an automatic reply, so the customer still gets a real answer from someone on your team.

What you get out of it

Customers stop waiting in silence
A ping after an hour means a message is answered while the customer is still at their phone, instead of the next morning when they have given up or complained elsewhere.
Reviews stay about your product
Many angry reviews are about being ignored, not about the product. Catching unanswered chats removes a common cause of one-star ratings you could have prevented. A prompt answer often turns a frustrated customer into a loyal one, whereas silence makes them look for someone else.
A measurable response promise
If you advertise replies within an hour, this checks whether you meet it. The alerts show where the gaps are, such as lunch breaks, so you can fix the rota.
Nothing lost in a busy inbox
Chats sink as new ones arrive. The alert lists the ones that sank, so a quiet question from a quiet customer gets the same care as a loud one. A real person gets a fair share of attention even if they write once and then wait quietly for an answer.
Fair workload across the team
Seeing who is waiting lets a manager hand the chat to whoever is free, instead of everyone assuming someone else already replied. Visible gaps keep the whole team accountable for the same standard of speed without a manager chasing people.

How it works

What happens, step by step

Each time a customer messages your WhatsApp Business number, ClickRuntime notes when they wrote.
When someone on your team replies, that customer is taken off the waiting list.
Every 15 minutes it checks for customers who have waited more than an hour.
It posts their numbers to your #support Slack channel, once per wait, so you don't get repeat pings.

Before it runs live

Connect WhatsApp Business
Paste your automation's link into the other app's webhook settings

What you get

RunsCollects as they arrive, acts daily

Get pinged when a WhatsApp customer waits over an hourtoday, 9:00Succeeded

Slack · #supportNo reply for over an hour: +447700900123 +447700900456

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.

Your own rules
Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.
Any number of apps
One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.
AI where it helps
Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.
On a schedule or on each event
Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

Act only on the items that match your own rules, and skip the rest
Add an AI step, for example to summarize, sort or draft a reply
Add another app, for example also send it to Slack
Combine it with other WhatsApp Business steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.

unanswered_message_alert.pyexample

import time
from clickruntime import on_event, on_trigger, state, notify

@on_event
def track(event):
    value = event.json["entry"][0]["changes"][0]["value"]
    waiting = state.get("waiting") or {}
    for m in value.get("messages", []):
        waiting.setdefault(m["from"], int(m["timestamp"]))
    for s in value.get("statuses", []):
        if s["status"] == "sent":
            waiting.pop(s["recipient_id"], None)
    state.set("waiting", waiting)
    return {"waiting": len(waiting)}

@on_trigger
def check(event):
    waiting = state.get("waiting") or {}
    alerted = state.get("alerted") or []
    late = [n for n, ts in waiting.items() if time.time() - ts > 3600 and n not in alerted]
    if late:
        notify.slack("No reply for over an hour:\n" + "\n".join(f"+{n}" for n in late), channel="#support")
    state.set("alerted", [n for n in alerted + late if n in waiting])
    return {"late": len(late)}

FAQ

Common questions

What counts as a reply?

An outbound message to that number recorded by WhatsApp's status events clears the timer. A reply sent from the business phone directly is counted too, as long as WhatsApp reports its status to the webhook.

Can I change the one-hour limit or the check interval?

Yes. Both numbers are simple settings, so you could alert after 30 minutes or only during opening hours. Ask your AI assistant for the combination that matches your promise to customers. Each setting is easy to adjust after you see how often alerts fire.

Will it alert outside business hours?

By default it would, since the clock keeps running. Most teams restrict alerts to opening hours so night messages are held until morning rather than pinging someone at 2 a.m. That avoids noise after hours.

What permissions does it need?

whatsapp_business_messaging. Nothing else in your accounts is used.

Does it need AI?

No. It runs without AI, so it doesn't use your plan's AI allowance.

How many runs does it use?

One run each time it checks. Checks that find nothing new and stop right away aren't counted.

Can I change how it works?

Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Collects as they arrive, acts daily