eCommunicate Messaging APIs

Put WhatsApp, SMS, and Live Chat in front of your agents. Two-way conversations, full history, tickets, and bot-to-agent handover through one API — plus templates, delivery receipts, and automatic SMS fallback when you need to reach customers first.

Get Started Live Chat Omnichannel API SMS Gateway

Contact centre as a service (CCaaS) platforms let a customer service team handle interactions across every channel from one place — self-service or agent-assisted — with the customer experience and the agent experience treated as one problem.

Our WhatsApp and SMS platform integrates with a CCaaS over APIs and webhooks, so both channels appear in the agent desktop alongside voice, email, and everything else you already route.

Premium customer service experiences come from premium employee assistance and follow-up, so the platform also lets you monitor and rate the quality of each engagement:

• Customer ratings — terminating a chat sends the rating widget, and the response comes back as a RATING message
• Follow-up tracking — tickets with status workflows (OPEN, AWAITING_AGENT, AWAITING_CUSTOMER, RESOLVED, CLOSED), searchable by agent or by rating
• Reporting — conversation analytics and exports as XLSX or CSV

A WhatsApp conversation only becomes two-way once the customer messages you — that message opens the 24-hour customer service window, and until it closes your agents can send free-form replies. So there are two ways in: wait for the customer to message first, or send a template to prompt them.

Template send ──> Customer replies ──> 24h window opens ──> Free-form messaging
   (business)         (webhook)                              (until it closes)

Decide who owns the conversation logic before you write any code — it determines which webhook you listen to and which endpoint you send on.

Both models send templates the same way, and both get delivery receipts on statusUpdateURL.

Same for both models.

Reach a customer who hasn't messaged you yet. Templates are pre-approved, so they can be sent at any time — outside the window included.

curl -X POST https://api.payless4messaging.com/whatsapp-api-service/v2/messages \
  -H "Authorization: YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: 8f14e45f-ceea-467a-9f2c-4b1d3e5a7c90" \
  -d '{
    "channel": "WHATSAPP",
    "payload": {
      "sender": "+27123456789",
      "templateName": "seasonal_promo_text",
      "templateId": "your-template-uuid",
      "messageType": "NOTIFICATION",
      "messages": [
        {
          "recipients": [{ "to": "+27987654321", "customerUserId": "ZA.1021033720668862" }],
          "components": [
            { "type": "body", "parameters": ["John"] }
          ]
        }
      ]
    }
  }'

Response (202 Accepted):

{
  "status": "ACCEPTED",
  "message": "Request accepted",
  "requestId": "c3a1f8e2-4b6d-11ee-be56-0242ac120002",
  "channel": "WHATSAPP",
  "timestamp": "2026-01-15T10:30:00Z"
}

The customer's reply opens the window. Which webhook you read it from depends on the model you picked.

Your chatbotWebhookURL receives a POST carrying chatParticipantId — the id every live-chat call needs — plus conversation status and the assigned agent:

{
  "eventId": "741f73c4-d8f9-4553-ae71-938b56d9ce90",
  "direction": "INCOMING",
  "timestamp": 1779878219796,
  "chatParticipantId": "aef65b5a-23a4-462a-a275-9aa2f3e0e56e",
  "conversationStatus": "ACTIVE",
  "conversationClosed": false,
  "chatBotConversation": true,
  "clientRef": "your-client-ref",
  "senderMsisdn": "27987654321",
  "receiverMsisdn": "+27123456789",
  "messageType": "BUTTON",
  "messageText": "Track my order",
  "templateId": "9874dc22-d4f7-4b81-b991-cd7f364faa2c",
  "templateName": "seasonal_promo_text"
}

templateId and templateName are present when the reply follows a template send, so you can correlate the response back to the campaign that triggered it. With chatbotIncludeOutgoing on, your chatbot's own replies arrive here too as OUTGOING events — the full transcript, not just the customer's half.

Your incomingMessageURL receives the customer's message with the sender's identity and the text:

{
  "profileName": "John Smith",
  "sender": "+27987654321",
  "senderUserId": "ZA.1021033720668862",
  "receiver": "+27123456789",
  "text": "Hi, I need help with my order",
  "messageType": "INTERACTION",
  "messageContentType": "TEXT",
  "sentTime": "2026-01-15T10:30:00.000+00:00",
  "status": "RECEIVED"
}

Both webhooks fire independently when a customer message arrives, so you can run both while you migrate from one model to the other.

The window is open, so free-form messages are allowed until it closes.

One endpoint sends on every channel — WhatsApp, Web, or Facebook — and the agent is resolved from your API key. Only messages sent this way appear in the live-chat thread.

curl -X POST https://api.payless4messaging.com/pl4chat-service/api/v2/messages \
  -H "Authorization: $ECOMM_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "participantId": "participant-uuid",
    "channel": "WHATSAPP",
    "text": "Here is the information you requested."
  }'

participantId is the chatParticipantId from the chatbot webhook in step 2.

Response:

{
  "id": "c9d01234-e5f6-a7b8-c9d0-1234e5f6a7b8",
  "sequenceNumber": 42,
  "direction": "OUTGOING",
  "contentType": "TEXT",
  "channel": "WHATSAPP",
  "text": "Here is the information you requested.",
  "createdTime": "2026-01-15T10:30:00Z",
  "userOriginated": true,
  "messageOwner": "agent",
  "sender": "+27123456789",
  "receiver": "+27987654321"
}

Running your own bot or agent desktop? Send free-form session messages through the same endpoint you used for the template in step 1 — swap messageType from NOTIFICATION to CHAT, drop the template fields, and put your text in messageText:

POST /whatsapp-api-service/v2/messages

{
  "channel": "WHATSAPP",
  "payload": {
    "sender": "+27123456789",
    "messageType": "CHAT",
    "messages": [
      {
        "recipients": [{ "to": "+27987654321" }],
        "messageText": "Hello, this is a standard session message."
      }
    ]
  }
}

Same auth, same client code as step 1 — only the payload changes. Add a media object with url and caption to attach a file. See Chat message for the media variant and the WhatsApp-specific endpoint.

Everything an agent desktop needs, in the order you'd call it:

GET  /pl4chat-service/api/v2/chats?scope=unassigned&search=27987654321  # queue view (no webhook id)
GET  /pl4chat-service/api/v2/messages?participantId={id}                # load the history
POST /pl4chat-service/api/v2/messages/typing?participantId={id}         # show a typing bubble
POST /pl4chat-service/api/v2/messages                                   # reply
POST /pl4chat-service/api/v2/messages/read?participantId={id}           # clear unread + read receipt
POST /pl4chat-service/api/v2/chats/{id}/terminate                       # close + send rating widget

The first call is only needed when you're building a queue view or don't have a chatParticipantId to hand — the chatbot webhook already gives you one. Scope it to my, team, unassigned, missed-agent, or closed to drive the agent's tabs.

Full walkthrough: Live Chat guide.

Plain SMS over the dedicated SMS Gateway — authenticate with an API key and post your recipients:

curl -X POST https://api.payless4sms.com/sms/json \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "X-API-Key: ecomm_your_api_key" \
  -d '{
    "messages": [
      { "recipients": [{ "to": "27821234567" }], "messageText": "Hello from eCommunicate" }
    ]
  }'

Need WhatsApp fallback, bulk sending, or two-way campaigns? See Which SMS product should I use?.

Live Chat sits on top of these — it carries conversations from WhatsApp (Cloud or Lite), Web, and Facebook into the same agent inbox.

We offer three ways to send SMS. Pick based on how you want to integrate:

Our team is here to help you integrate.

• Email — support@ecommunicate.co.za
• Website — ecommunicate.co.za
• API Status — Include the requestId from any error response when contacting support