White-label WhatsApp API for South African agencies, bulk-SMS companies, ISPs and web hosts

Who this is for in South Africa

South African SMEs already buy their domain, hosting, fibre or SMS bundles from a supplier they know. WhatsApp is the next thing they ask that supplier for, and most of them want someone local to set it up and answer the phone when a template is rejected. This page is for:

• Bulk-SMS companies whose clients are moving OTPs, delivery notices and specials from SMS to WhatsApp, and who would rather sell the WhatsApp channel than lose the account.
• ISPs and wireless ISPs that already bill small businesses monthly and want a product that is not another bandwidth upgrade.
• Web hosting and domain companies that sell hosting, business email and WordPress or WooCommerce sites.
• Digital and performance-marketing agencies in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban or Pretoria that run Meta ads for clients and want to own what happens after the click, including Click-to-WhatsApp campaigns.
• CRM and software consultants serving insurance brokers, estate agencies, medical practices or schools.

It is not the right fit if you want a once-off set-up fee and no ongoing relationship. WhatsApp needs template approvals, consent records and someone to call when the messaging limit or quality rating changes. Partners who do well sell it as a managed monthly service.

What carries your brand

Two things are not yours to brand: Meta's Embedded Signup window, which is Meta's own screen, and the WhatsApp messages themselves, which show your client's display name.

How the money works

Keep three flows apart when you price the product:

1. Your clients pay you. You create plans in rand in the partner panel (for example a Starter plan with two team members and a Business plan with five plus the chatbot) and collect payment by EFT with proof of payment, or by card through your own Stripe account where Stripe is available to your business. Your own payment gateways, custom domain and own email and SMS senders come with the Growth and Enterprise partner plans.
2. You pay Broadchat. You pay a cost price per client account for each billing cycle (monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or yearly), debited from your prepaid partner wallet when a client buys or renews. You top up the partner wallet by international bank transfer, or by card through Stripe where it is enabled for your account. The cost price depends on volume, billing cycle and modules, so it is quoted on request; ask which currency your partner wallet is billed in.
3. Messaging passes through wallets. Each client prepays a messaging wallet at the rates you set, as a percentage or flat markup over Meta's base rate for each country and category. Your margin, your rate minus Meta's base rate, is settled into your main partner wallet every week, on Sunday evening South African time.

Pricing in rand when Meta prices in dollars

Meta has no rand rate card, so the cost under your messaging rates moves with the exchange rate. Two approaches work: set a percentage markup, so your margin follows Meta's base rate automatically, or set fixed rand prices with enough headroom for a weaker rand and review them every quarter, when Meta's own rates can change. Tell clients which approach you use before their first invoice.

A worked example (illustrative only)

Say Sipho runs a hosting company in Durban and signs 25 SME clients on a WhatsApp plan he prices at R650 a month. His platform cost is whatever Broadchat quotes him per client account; call it C. His monthly subscription margin is 25 × (R650 − C). On top of that, his clients send 40,000 utility messages a month to South African numbers, at Meta's US$0.0095 per delivered utility message (Meta rate card effective 1 Oct 2026). With a 25% markup his messaging margin is 40,000 × US$0.0095 × 25% = US$95, about R1,710 at an illustrative R18 to the dollar. These numbers show the arithmetic, not a forecast; try your own in the reseller profit calculator.

Bulk-SMS companies and ISPs: how it fits your existing billing

Most South African SMS providers and ISPs already run their own billing and client portals. Broadchat has no WHMCS module or SMS-platform plug-in today. What works now:

• Sell WhatsApp as its own product with your own plans in the Broadchat partner panel; clients sign up on your branded panel address.
• Or invoice it on your existing system next to the SMS bundle or fibre line, and give the client access from the partner panel. Enterprise partners get the Partner API, which lists your client accounts, returns a client's wallet balances and recent transactions, and moves balance from your partner wallet into a client's wallet, so a developer can keep top-ups in step with invoices your system marks as paid.

Put WhatsApp next to SMS in your price list rather than next to hosting: the buyer is the same person who buys SMS credits, and the use cases (OTPs, delivery notices, appointment reminders) move across almost one for one.

Onboarding a South African client

1. Check the business details. The legal name exactly as on the CIPC registration certificate, a website on HTTPS showing that name, and the number that will be on WhatsApp.
2. Create the client account in your partner panel and assign a plan.
3. Connect the number with the client through Embedded Signup inside the client's own Meta business portfolio. Meta's In-App Signup is not offered in South Africa, so Embedded Signup is the route; if the number is on the WhatsApp Business app, coexistence can often keep it there. See getting the WhatsApp Business API in South Africa for verification documents.
4. Write the first templates together: a confirmation (utility), a reminder (utility) and one promotion for opted-in customers (marketing), in English or Afrikaans as their customers prefer.
5. Import contacts with a consent record: a tag noting where and when consent came from, which WhatsApp's policy and POPIA section 69 both expect. This is general guidance, not legal advice.
6. Watch the first two weeks: quality rating, template status and the messaging limit, which starts at 250 people a day for a new portfolio.

What to know before you sign up

• Broadchat is not a Meta Business Solution Provider; numbers are connected through Meta's Embedded Signup and messages go through the Cloud API.
• The panel is available in 23 languages, including English; there is no Afrikaans, isiZulu or isiXhosa translation of the panel yet, though you can adjust translations per partner.
• Built-in WhatsApp payment collection is not available in South Africa; clients add a link from PayFast, Yoco, Ozow or their own provider to a template button.
• Client data is processed through Meta's Cloud API and Broadchat's servers outside South Africa. Clients with strict POPIA cross-border requirements (section 72) will ask about this; answer it upfront.
• Meta decides template approval, business verification, display names and messaging limits. Nobody can promise them, and you should not either.

The global partner programme page lists every partner feature, and WhatsApp Business API in South Africa is the page to send end clients who want to understand what they are buying.