Tell Customers Their Delivery Date on WhatsApp with AfterShip
Yes. AeroChat works directly with AfterShip. When a customer asks when their order will arrive, AeroChat finds the shipment in AfterShip, reads the estimated delivery date it holds and replies with the date or date range in the same chat.
This recipe answers “when will it arrive?” and “will it come before Friday?” from the delivery estimate in AfterShip, so the customer gets a date instead of a vague “soon”. Part of connecting AfterShip to WhatsApp and AI chat.
What happens today
A customer needs the order by a certain day: a birthday, a trip, an event. They message to ask when it will arrive. Someone opens AfterShip, finds the shipment, reads the estimate and works out whether it will make it. When the estimate moves because of a delay at the carrier, nobody tells the customer until they ask again, often annoyed.
The flow that works
- The customer asks when their order will arrive, or whether it will arrive by a date.
- AeroChat asks for the order number, or uses the tracking number or email they give.
- It finds the shipment in AfterShip and reads the latest estimated delivery date, and the earliest and latest dates where AfterShip gives a range.
- It replies with the date in plain words and answers their actual question, such as “yes, before Friday”.
- If AfterShip has no estimate yet, it says what stage the parcel is at and shares your tracking page link.
- If the date they need is later than the estimate, it hands the conversation to your team with the details.
What it looks like on WhatsApp
Customer: Hi, will order 20914 arrive before Saturday? It’s a birthday present. (example)
AeroChat: Good news. Your parcel is in transit with UPS and AfterShip expects it on Thursday, between Wednesday and Friday at the latest. You can follow it here: https://track.example.com/20914 (example)
Customer: Perfect, thank you!
In AfterShip: nothing changes. AeroChat read the estimated delivery date and range for the shipment on order 20914.
The recipe
Copy this into AeroChat
When a customer asks when their order will arrive, or whether it will arrive by a certain date, follow these steps.
- Ask for their order number if we do not have it. Accept a tracking number or the email they ordered with instead.
- Find the shipment in AfterShip.
- Read the latest estimated delivery date. If AfterShip gives an earliest and a latest date, give the range too.
- Reply in one or two lines with the date written as a day and date, and send our AfterShip tracking page link.
- If they asked about a specific date, answer that question directly: yes, no, or it is close.
- If there is no estimate yet, tell them the latest status and that the date will show on the tracking page once the carrier scans the parcel.
- If the estimate is later than the date they need, or the parcel shows an exception, tell them a team member will help and hand over the conversation with the order number and the date they need.
Never promise a delivery date that AfterShip does not show. Reply in the customer’s language.
Change the handover rule to match what your team can do for late orders, such as an upgrade to express shipping, before you paste it.
What to connect
- Your Shopify store. Built in. Install AeroChat from the Shopify App Store and connect your store in the dashboard, so AeroChat can match the customer to their order.
- AfterShip. Open the API keys page in your AfterShip admin, create an API key and paste it in when AeroChat asks. As of November 2026, AfterShip includes API access on its Premium tracking plan and above.
- Your knowledge base. Add your shipping times by region and what you offer when an order will be late, so AeroChat answers the follow-up questions.
AeroChat reads whatever estimate AfterShip holds for the shipment. Where the estimate comes from, the carrier, AfterShip’s own prediction or your settings, is set in AfterShip.
After you paste the recipe, AeroChat builds the workflow as a draft and shows a checklist: connect AfterShip, add your knowledge base if the recipe uses one, then switch it on. If it built the connection from AfterShip’s public documentation, the checklist asks you to check it once against the current docs.
Using a different system? If it has a public API, it connects to AeroChat the same way: describe what you want, paste in its key, and it runs.
Can’t find your tool? Message us in the chat on this page and we’ll tell you how it connects.
What you still decide
- Whether AeroChat gives the single date, the range, or both.
- What happens when an order will miss the date a customer needs.
- Who takes the handover for late or stuck parcels.
The result to expect
Customers who need an order by a certain day get a straight answer from the estimate in AfterShip, at any hour. Your team only sees the orders that will be late.
Measure it with your own numbers: delivery date questions answered by hand, and orders canceled because a customer was unsure it would arrive in time, for a month before and after.
Next: answer where-is-my-parcel questions with AfterShip, or sign customers up for delivery updates from the chat.
Works on every chat channel
This workflow runs the same way on WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, the chat on your store and email, with the same AfterShip connection behind it. See what each channel does on the AfterShip integration page.
Answer your first delivery date question in chat
Install AeroChat, paste the recipe, add your AfterShip API key, and ask your own chat when your latest order will arrive.
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