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A Quick-Start Guide to Setting Up a WhatsApp Ticketing System

May 24, 2025
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11 min read
A Quick-Start Guide to Setting Up a WhatsApp Ticketing System

Whether it’s a delayed delivery, a missed appointment, or a customer wondering why the “amazing discount code” they found on a random website isn’t working — they’re not just emailing you anymore. They’re reaching out on WhatsApp, especially when they need answers fast, not in 2-3 business days.

At the same time, as more conversations shift to WhatsApp, the complexities of maintaining organization also increase on your end. Without the right system in place, things can quickly spiral — missed messages, unassigned tickets, and irritated customers. That’s where a structured WhatsApp ticketing system comes in.

In this article, we’ll walk you through how to build a WhatsApp ticketing system that works — so your team can stay on top of things and finally catch their breath. 

What is a WhatsApp Ticketing System?

A WhatsApp ticketing system is a customer support tool that helps agents manage customer interactions on WhatsApp, helping them convert chats into “trackable” tickets to speed up ticket resolution times and improve team collaboration.

Here’s how it works: Every time a customer sends a message on WhatsApp, it’s instantly turned into a “ticket” with key details like who the customer is, what they need, and how urgent it is. From there, your team can review customer history, add notes, assign the ticket to an agent, and keep everything moving.

Depending on whether you’re using the standard WhatsApp for Business app or a WhatsApp Solutions Provider (like Gallabox), you can expect features ranging from smart ticket routing and shared inboxes to customer profiles, chatbots, and agent performance dashboards.

A typical WhatsApp ticketing system (in Gallabox)

Top Benefits of Using WhatsApp for Ticketing

Now that we’ve seen how things work, let’s quickly go over the advantages of using a WhatsApp-based ticketing system. 

Meet customers where they are

Not only is WhatsApp used by over 2 billion people worldwide, but around 175 million of them message a business on WhatsApp every single day. That’s a huge opportunity to connect with your customers in a space they already trust and use daily. No extra apps to download. No complicated sign-ins. Just quick conversations — in a channel where they’re already spending their time. 

And as most WhatsApp Business Solution Providers, which power your WhatsApp ticketing system, come with multi-agent access, your entire team can access customer tickets from their own device and review all tickets. This ensures full context, transparency, and collaboration.

Centralize tickets with multi-agent access and shared inboxes

Be available 24/7

Whether you’re using simple rule-based chatbots to handle simple workflows like appointment bookings and NPS surveys or an AI bot to answer FAQs and understand context, WhatsApp chatbots help you stay responsive around the clock.

With WhatsApp chatbots, you can scale support — without scaling your team

They keep things moving even when your team’s offline, reduce wait times, and free up agents to handle more complex issues. 

Also Read: How Jobstars India used WhatsApp + Gallabox to automate over 60% of candidate conversations

Increase team productivity

Many Business Solutions Providers (BSPs) come with features like canned responses, genAI support, and automated workflows that take care of repetitive tasks on-screen and behind the scenes. The result? Your agents spend less time juggling chats and more time solving problems — faster, more efficiently, and with fewer handoffs or escalations. 

But that’s not all, you can also measure agent productivity with conversation analytics like first response time, active conversations by agent, and more. This helps identify areas for improvement, optimize workflows, and enhance overall customer satisfaction

Optimize your workflows with in-depth conversation analytics — by customer, agent, and even bot

Real-world impact: How Dubai Housekeeping improved their CSAT scores by 47%

When Dubai Housekeeping found their phone lines couldn’t keep up with growing customer service demand, they made the switch to WhatsApp using Gallabox’s WhatsApp Business API platform. 

By bringing their team into a shared inbox, automating common queries with chatbots, and streamlining responses using generative AI, they saw big results: a 47% jump in CSAT scores and a 25% boost in team productivity

Read how Dubai Housekeeping scaled customer support with WhatsApp + Gallabox

Step-by-Step Guide to Setting Up a WhatsApp Ticketing System

Moving on to the practical aspects, here’s a guide on how you can set up a robust WhatsApp ticketing system. But first, here’s why you’d do better with WhatsApp Business API than the standard WhatsApp Business app for ticketing:

  • The WhatsApp Business App is designed for small businesses and offers only the basics like business profiles, automated messages, and product catalogs. No shared inbox, automations, or multi-agent support. 
  • The WhatsApp Business API, on the other hand, comes with multiple agent support, ticket routing, chatbots, advanced automations, CRM and help desk integrations, and more — giving you a “complete” ticketing system.

Now, let’s explore how you can set up a ticketing system on WhatsApp Business API, but before that, keep the following ready:

  • A Facebook Business Manager Account to manage your business presence across Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
  • A live business website to verify the legitimacy of your business.
  • A phone number not currently registered with any WhatsApp account. If reusing a number, be sure to delete the existing WhatsApp account first.

Step 1: Creating your WhatsApp Business account with a BSP

Most Business Solution Providers (BSPs) have an “embedded sign-up flow” that allows you to sign up for the WhatsApp Business API directly from their app or website. This typically includes everything from connecting your Facebook Business Manager account and adding your business details to verifying your phone number to integrating the BSP with WhatsApp Business API.

Creating a WhatsApp Business Profile in Gallabox

Once this is done, you’ll need to provide certain legal documents to help Meta verify your business's legitimacy. And remember, this is not the same as getting the coveted “Blue Tick.” For that, you need to reach the Tier 2 Quality Level and send a minimum of 1,000 messages per month. 

Step 2: Setting up your WhatsApp ticketing system

​After creating your WhatsApp Business account with a BSP, the next step is to configure your ticketing system. Here’s how:

Onboard your team

Bring your customer support (and sales) team into WhatsApp. This often involves creating individual agent profiles and assigning specific roles and permissions to each team member to ensure data security. 

Define your ticket-routing rules

Establish clear guidelines on how incoming messages should be categorized and assigned to your team. For example, Gallabox allows you to route tickets by:

  • Round-robin routing to distribute tickets equally between all online agents and balance workloads.
  • Contact owner routing to allow the same agent to handle all conversations with a customer.
  • Bot or team-based routing to assign tickets to a certain team (or bot) based on the nature of the query.

Ticket assignment in Gallabox

Deploy your chatbots

Finally, use your BSP’s chatbot builder to create rule-based or AI chatbots to handle routine queries. Another idea is setting up simple bots to collect basic information before assigning it to an agent — super useful when your team’s out-of-office.

And you’re done with the foundational aspects of your WhatsApp Business ticketing system. As you start processing customer tickets, you’ll get an idea of what labels, filters, and automated workflows you need to further optimize your customer support workflows. 

Also read: Best WhatsApp Chatbot Examples

Challenges with WhatsApp Ticketing (and How to Fix Them)

​Implementing a WhatsApp ticketing system is great for customer support, but it’s not without challenges. Here are three of the more common ones, along with tips on solving them.

Challenge 1: Balancing chatbot conversations with real agent support

Automation is great for handling those repetitive questions like "How to set up an account?" or "Where's my order?" But if you overdo it, customers can quickly become frustrated by impersonal, canned responses — their lack of empathy driving customers away.

The fix: Make bots your first (and last) support touchpoint

Let your chatbot handle the basics — FAQs, appointment bookings, order tracking — and then bring in a human when the issue gets complex. We also suggest adding a “Talk to an Agent” button right inside your chatbot flow, so customers can escalate on their terms.

And once the agent wraps up the conversation, the bot can take over to collect feedback through a CSAT survey. This keeps the conversation going naturally, from bot to agent and back.

Challenge 2: Keeping up with WhatsApp's 24-hour limit for first response 

WhatsApp has a 24-hour rule. That means if a customer messages you and you don’t respond within 24 hours, you’ll need to wait for them to message you again or use a paid message template to re-engage

If your team is handling dozens of tickets a day, it’s easy for some to slip through the cracks, especially during peak hours. And that can lead to dropped chats and frustrated customers, not to mention added costs.

The fix: Respond faster with bots, rules, and alerts

Start by using auto-replies or bots to get some details. This will help extend your window as the clock resets with every new message from a customer. Next, use smart routing rules to send tickets to the right agent right away (so messages don’t sit in a backlog).

Finally, create internal notifications — like when a ticket is assigned or getting close to that 24-hour mark — so nothing slips through the cracks.

Challenge 3: Integrating WhatsApp with your existing support tools

If you're like most support teams, WhatsApp isn't your only channel. You've got emails coming in, chats on your Instagram or Facebook Messenger, and a help desk tracking every interaction. 

And if you don’t integrate WhatsApp with your help desk, then your team’s missing context, or juggling tabs to piece together the full story. Not the best way to provide fast or personalized support.

The fix: Choose a BSP that plays well with others

The first step is picking a Business Solution Provider that offers native integrations with popular CRMs and help desk tools (like Gallabox!). If you’re using a custom-built or niche tool, look for support for webhooks, so you can build your own integrations using platforms like Zapier or Pabbly Connect.

We recommend doing a bit of extra research — while many tools say they connect with Zapier, the real value comes from the specific triggers and actions they support.

Build Your WhatsApp Ticketing System with Gallabox

To offer standout customer service on WhatsApp, you need more than quick replies or even shared inboxes or bots. You need a system that adapts to the way your team works — whether that’s managing everything inside WhatsApp or syncing with your external tools and platforms.

Gallabox gives you that flexibility. You can start small with simple automations, like assigning tickets or launching simple rule-based bots. And as you scale, build more complex workflows using advanced rules, provide localized support with multilingual chatbot, and speed up replies with genAI support.

And with Gallabox’s 30+ direct integrations ranging from popular CRMs and help desks to logistics providers, you can build a WhatsApp ticketing system that’s truly connected.

Want to run a WhatsApp-first custom support program? Start your free Gallabox trial today!

FAQs on WhatsApp Ticketing System

1. How does a WhatsApp Ticketing System work?

When a customer messages your business on WhatsApp, the ticketing system turns that chat into a ticket. From there, your team can assign it, respond to it, and resolve it — all from one shared inbox. 

2. Do I need WhatsApp Business API to set up a ticketing system?

Yes, if you want “ticketing” features like multi-agent access, shared inboxes, and chatbots, you’ll need the WhatsApp Business API. It’s built for teams and scales as you grow, turning WhatsApp into a complete support channel.

The WhatsApp Business app only allows you to chat with customers, set quick replies, and add labels, and is built for one account. So, while it’s great for smaller teams, it won’t give you the tools you need for really scaling up customer support.

3. Can I integrate WhatsApp Ticketing with my CRM or Helpdesk?

Short answer: yes. Long answer: You can if you’re using WhatsApp Business API and your Business Solutions Provider supports CRM and help desk integrations. Some (like Gallabox) do, while others don’t. So do your research beforehand. 

Get your business on WhatsApp with Gallabox

Get your business on WhatsApp with Gallabox

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