Home¶
The Home is the assistant's control centre and your business overview. It's the first screen you see when you enter the dashboard.
At the top there's a green band with the overline YOUR WHATSAPP ASSISTANT, your business name and the status Active, replying to messages. On the right sits the assistant's master switch: on, the assistant replies to your clients; off, everything stays silent. It's Wably's most important control.
The assistant's controls¶
The controls sit in four cards, split by who they affect: the tone the assistant speaks in, what it does towards your clients, what reaches you by email, and the address book and cost protection side.
How it replies¶
The How it replies card, subtitled "The tone of messages to your clients", holds the Tone selector with two options:
- Friendly: informal register.
- Formal: polite, formal register.
(available from the Standard plan)
With your clients¶
The With your clients card, subtitled "What the assistant does towards the people who message you", gathers two toggles.
Send reminders - "Send the client the appointment reminder the day before." When it's on, the Type selector appears, with two options:
- Alert: sends a simple informational reminder.
- Confirmation: sends a confirmation request with buttons, so the client can confirm or change the appointment directly from WhatsApp.
(available from the Standard plan)
Review request - "Asks for the review 72h after the first appointment." When you switch it on, Wably automatically sends the review request 72 hours after the first appointment. If the contact left an email at booking, the link arrives by email; otherwise, Wably offers it during the client's next WhatsApp conversation. You set the link to send in Info & services, in the Review link field.
Alerts for you¶
The Alerts for you card, subtitled "What reaches you by email", gathers two toggles.
Daily summary by email - "Receive a daily email at 7:00 pm with everything the assistant has handled." See the section below.
Upcoming appointment cancellation alert - "Receive an email as soon as a client cancels or reschedules an appointment within the time window you select." When it's on, the Alert me if less than selector appears, with the 24, 48 and 72 hour thresholds. See the dedicated section further on.
Address book and protection¶
The Address book and protection card, subtitled "Saving contacts and shielding your costs", holds one toggle and one selector.
Save new contacts to Google Contacts - "The assistant adds new clients to your address book." Clients who book an appointment through Wably on WhatsApp are automatically added to the Google address book connected to your account. The toggle is optional: if you leave it off, Wably still manages bookings without saving contacts to your Google address book.
Daily safety limit - "Pauses the assistant beyond this number of messages a day. We'll let you know by email." The selector has four values: 200, 360, 800 and 1500 messages a day. See the dedicated section further on.
The daily summary by email¶
With the Daily summary by email toggle on, you receive an email at 7:00 pm with everything the assistant has handled.
The email only goes out if there was something to report: if the assistant recorded no new bookings and no changes in the last 24 hours, you get nothing.
Why that's better
No empty emails to open only to find out nothing happened. Every summary that arrives contains something that actually happened, so it's worth reading.
The toggle is optional: if you leave it off, you won't receive any summary.
Alert for cancellations of upcoming appointments¶
When a client cancels or reschedules an appointment by writing to your assistant on WhatsApp, and that appointment was close, you get an email within a few minutes. So you know a slot has freed up while there's still time to fill it.
With Alert me if less than you choose the threshold: 24, 48 or 72 hours. If the client cancels an appointment set beyond that threshold we don't disturb you: you'll find it in the daily summary.
The email shows the slot that has freed up, how long is left, the client's name and the service, with a button to message them on WhatsApp in one tap. If several slots free up at the same time, they all arrive in a single email.
Why the threshold matters
A slot that frees up with a day's notice can still be sold: you call whoever is waiting for a place and you fill it. The same slot discovered the next morning is lost revenue.
What triggers the alert
- It covers the cancellations and reschedules that clients make on WhatsApp through the assistant. Changes you make yourself directly on the calendar don't generate alerts.
- For a reschedule, what counts is the slot left free: the email also shows the new time the client picked.
- You can switch the alert off whenever you like, from the Alerts for you card.
Availability
The cancellation alert is included in the plans that come with appointment reminders. It isn't available on the Starter plan: you'll find the full comparison on the plans and pricing page.
Daily safety limit: how to protect your WhatsApp costs¶
The messages the assistant sends on WhatsApp aren't billed by Wably: they're billed by Meta, straight to your business's WhatsApp Business account. They're your expense, so we give you a simple way to keep them in check.
The Daily safety limit pauses the assistant if it goes past the number of messages you picked within 24 hours. It's there for the odd situations: a spam run, a number that writes obsessively, another automated system that answers the assistant in a loop. Rare cases, but if they happen overnight they push your spend up without you noticing.
The default value is 360 messages a day: more than enough for a practice with a full diary. The other values available are 200, 800 and 1500.
When the limit kicks in, the assistant stops replying until midnight in the time zone you set in Profile, then starts again on its own. At the same moment you get an email straight away with:
- the messages sent during the day,
- the limit you had set,
- the time the assistant switches back on,
- the numbers that triggered the most replies.
With those numbers in front of you it's a one minute decision: if a contact is abusing it, you block them straight from your WhatsApp app; if it was simply a busy day, you raise the limit from the Home and the assistant picks up again right away.
Anyone who messages the assistant during the pause gets a polite note once only, pointing them to you directly, then the assistant stays quiet: no repeated replies, no cost that multiplies.
The conversation isn't lost
Messages that arrive during the pause stay in your WhatsApp Business app like all the others. You read them and reply by hand whenever you want, without waiting for the assistant to come back on.
Availability
The Daily safety limit is included on every plan, Starter too: it protects an expense that's yours, so we don't put it behind a higher plan. To see what WhatsApp messages actually cost, the Wably plans and pricing page has the calculator that estimates your monthly spend from your own booking volume.
The protections you don't have to set up
On top of this limit, the assistant defends itself conversation by conversation. It stops exchanges that turn abnormal, whether from too many messages received in a few minutes or across the day, and it breaks off the ones where another automated system is replying on the other side. There's nothing to configure: it's always on, on every plan, and it only touches the abnormal conversation, not the rest.
The month's summary¶
Two panels show the assistant's activity for the current month:
- MANAGED THIS MONTH (Bookings and changes): the appointments booked and changed by the assistant.
- REMINDERS SENT (This month): the reminders sent.
Integrations¶
At the bottom of the Home, the Integrations card lists the connected services: WhatsApp Business, Google Calendar (with the name of the calendar in use) and Google Contacts. Each one shows the status Connected.
At the bottom of the card you'll find the Manage integrations link, which opens the Integrations screen: that's where you connect or disconnect services and choose which Google calendar the assistant should work on.
It all starts here
If the assistant isn't replying, the first thing to check is right here: is the master switch at the top on? And do the integrations show Connected?