whatsapp-receptionist-builderlisted

# WhatsApp Receptionist Builder ## Overview A receptionist on WhatsApp is not a chatbot with a calendar bolted on. It is a webhook that must answer in milliseconds, a queue that must not send the same message twice, a booking that must not double-book under concurrency, and a messaging window that closes 24 hours after the customer's last message whether you are ready or not. **Core principle: the webhook acknowledges, the worker thinks.** Everything else in this skill follows from that one decision. ## When to use - Building an AI receptionist, booking assistant or support agent on the WhatsApp Cloud API - Webhook returns 200 but Meta keeps retrying, or the customer receives the same reply twice - Signature verification fails and the secret is definitely correct - Messages send fine during a conversation and get rejected hours later - Two customers hold the same slot - Voice notes arrive and nothing happens - Routing several business numbers into one deployment **Not for:** WhatsApp marketing broadcasts, unofficial or reverse-engineered WhatsApp clients, or scraping. Those get numbers banned; the Cloud API is the only path that survives contact with a real business. A complete, working implementation of everything described here is [whatsapp-receptionist](https://github.com/Hiberius/whatsapp-receptionist) (Next.js, Supabase, MIT). ## The shape that works ``` Meta webhook ──► verify signature on the RAW body ──► record the message id, drop it if already