Moving a WhatsApp number between accounts or providers

A number can move between accounts or providers. It is a planned migration with downtime, not a setting change.

A number can move between accounts or providers. It is a planned migration with downtime, not a setting change.

The situations

• Between two Zendesk accounts, after a reorganisation or a merger.
• From another provider into Zendesk, when consolidating.
• Out of Zendesk to somewhere else.
• Onto your own WhatsApp Business Account, where the number was connected before Zendesk offered the self-service flow and so sits on a business account Zendesk hosts.

All four follow the same shape: release at one end, claim at the other, verify again. Three things have to line up before you start, and all three are easy to get wrong in a reorganisation:

• Two-step verification has to be off on the number before it can move. That one is yours rather than ours: it sits in your own WhatsApp Manager under Two-step verification, where you select the number and click Turn off two-step verification. A confirmation email follows, and the number is not ready until it arrives.
• The same Meta Business Manager ID as the one the business account was requested under.
• The same display name for the number. A tidied-up name blocks the move.

Only once that confirmation has arrived do you remove the integration at the current end, which takes the number offline.

What to expect

1. Downtime. Between release and reconnection the number cannot receive messages, and they are not queued.
2. Reverification. The voice or text verification is done again.
3. Approved templates travel, up to a point. Zendesk names what carries over: the display name, the quality rating, the messaging limit, Official Business Account status, and message templates that were already approved and rated high quality. Anything outside that list is worth checking at the destination before a campaign depends on it.
4. History does not travel. Old tickets stay where they are.

Plan around the downtime

Choose a quiet period, and tell customers on your other channels that WhatsApp is briefly unavailable. Messages sent during the gap are lost rather than delayed.

Templates first, if you can

Submitting templates at the destination before the move means approval is running while you wait, rather than after. That can be the difference between hours of downtime and days of reduced service.

See also

• Reconnecting your WhatsApp number
• Porting numbers to Zendesk
• Creating message templates