Important updates to template categories

Neelke Stadler Updated by Neelke Stadler

On June 1st, 2023 there will be changes to how Meta bills conversations on the WhatsApp Business Platform. To get ready for this, changes are happening on template categories.

From time to time things change. WhatsApp is getting ready to change how they bill conversations, and as an interim step they are changing how template categories work.

What is changing?

Template categories will be reduced to 3 categories only, i.e. Utility, Authentication and Marketing templates. For existing templates, WhatsApp will be migrating from old to new categories between April 1st, 2023 to and May 5th, 2023. New categories will be available for review from April 1st, 2023. Any new templates you create will only have the 3 new categories as options. 

Why is this important?

From June 1st 2023 conversation-based pricing is changing and the template’s category will determine the cost of the conversation. 

What do you need to do?

You should review the assigned categories for all your templates and if you do not agree with the new category WhatsApp automatically assigned to your template you need to appeal the assigned category before May 15th, 2023. 

Categorisation appeals should be done in your WhatsApp Manager panel by navigating to Account tools > Message templates. You need to select the template and click the “Edit category” button.

Our first customers will not have access to their WhatsApp Manager, only the BSP has access for numbers created before mid 2021. You will need to reach out to us to assist you with the appeal process.

More details on the category change

WhatsApp will assign all existing templates a new template category based on your content and their template guidelines. This process only affects a template's category. It has no effect on template status and will not factor into pricing until June 1, 2023.

You can view all your migration results in your WhatsApp Manager panel by navigating to Account tools > Message templates and clicking the “See all updates” button in the Alerts banner.

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