Guide · By industry
WhatsApp for online stores: delivery questions, order numbers and claims
In short
Most WhatsApp messages to an online store are about one order: where it is, when it comes, what to do when it arrives damaged. Ask for the order number before anything else, answer the general questions from delivery and returns pages you keep up to date, and turn every problem with one order into a ticket with an owner, so nothing waits in a chat until the customer asks again.
Reviewed 9 November 2026. Terms used: WhatsApp 24-hour window, Ticketing system, RAG (retrieval-augmented generation).
Eight steps to WhatsApp support for an online store
For a shop that sells online and delivers, with or without showrooms.
Answer from one business number
Put the store on one number on the WhatsApp Business Platform, answered from a shared inbox. A customer who wrote last week reaches the same history today, whoever is on shift.
Ask for the order number first
Show customers where to find it and what it looks like, then ask for it before anything else. Every answer about one order starts there, and your team stops asking twice.
The first question about an order Please type your order number. It starts with TH, for example TH-104233.
You’ll find it in your order email and on the delivery note.
Publish the answers people ask for every day
Delivery areas and times, delivery charges, what happens after a missed delivery, return windows and how warranty claims work. Write each as a short page, keep it current in sale season, and answer from it in the chat and on your website.
Take problems after hours, don’t lose them
Shoppers write at night. Outside your hours, answer the general questions from your pages and take a message for anything about one order: the order number, what went wrong and a photo. The morning team starts from a list, not a scroll.
Make every problem a ticket
A late, damaged or wrong delivery becomes a ticket in a category such as Delivery › Damaged on arrival, with an owner and a due time. The customer keeps writing in the chat; the ticket keeps the claim, its photos and its status together.
Send updates inside WhatsApp’s rules
Inside the customer’s 24-hour customer service window you can reply with any message. A delivery update after the window closes has to be an approved template, usually in Meta’s utility category, so prepare the few you need before sale season.
A delivery update template, as submitted Hi {{1}}, your order {{2}} is out for delivery on {{3}} between {{4}}.
Reply here if no one will be home.
Samples: Aisyah · TH-104233 · Thursday · 10 am and 1 pm
Keep card numbers out of the chat
Never ask for a card number or a password on WhatsApp, and say so in your refund page. Customers still paste them, so limit who sees chats and keep any AI away from those numbers.
Count claims by category
Each week, look at tickets by category and by courier or product. Ten damaged-on-arrival tickets on one item is a packaging problem, not a support one.
How it works in Axonave
The menu takes the order number, a message left at night becomes a ticket.
Axonave doesn’t connect to store platforms, so it doesn’t look orders up. Its WhatsApp menu asks for the order number and hands the chat to your delivery team with it, in English, Bahasa Malaysia or Chinese. The AI answers delivery and returns questions only from the help-centre articles you publish and names the one it used. After hours, a message left with the bot becomes a ticket in the category you set, with an SLA, and your team replies on WhatsApp from the ticket. A reply after the window goes as the approved template you pick, and card, bank and IC numbers are masked before any AI call.
- Categories such as Delivery › Late delivery
- Teams and automatic assignment for tickets
- Every chat and ticket on the customer’s record
A WhatsApp message left with the bot at night in our demo workspace became TKT-1201: Delivery › Late delivery, with order TH-104233 in the bot’s note.
Common questions
Can the bot look up an order in our store?
No. Axonave doesn’t connect to store platforms. The bot asks for the order number and passes the chat to your delivery team with it, so nobody asks twice.
Can customers send photos of a damaged item?
Yes. Photos sent on WhatsApp stay in the chat, and a message left after hours can carry attachments onto its ticket.
What does WhatsApp cost us?
Meta bills your WhatsApp account directly at its own rates. Axonave adds nothing per message, and Reports → Chats estimates your spend.
See it working with your own customers.
We reply within one business day by email or WhatsApp.