Guides/Ads & tracking

My ad conversions never reach Events Manager, or the dashboard says reporting is on hold

Almost always a permission, not your data: your ad account has not granted access to the system user in your own Business Manager. 4 min read

If the Ads page shows "Conversion reporting to Meta is on hold", or your conversions are recorded in WACO but never appear in Events Manager, the cause is almost always one thing: Meta refuses our events with error #270.

This Ads API request is not allowed for apps with development access level. Make sure that the access token belongs to a user that is both admin of the app and admin of the ad account.

In plain terms: the system user WACO uses is not recognised as a manager of your ad account. Your data is fine, your numbers are fine, and the dataset is correctly linked to your WhatsApp Business account. One permission checkbox in your own Business Manager is missing.

The fix, five minutes, you can do it yourself

Open business.facebook.com with an account that is an admin of your company's Business Manager.
Go to Business settings → Users → System users.
Pick the system user belonging to your WhatsApp provider. Its name contains the provider's name, for example IDCloudHost System User. It was created when you connected your number and it lives inside your own Business Manager.
Click Add assets → Ad accounts, pick the ad account you run click-to-WhatsApp ads from, and grant Manage campaigns (or full control).
On the same assets screen, also pick Data sources → Datasets, tick your WhatsApp dataset (the id is shown on the WACO Ads page under Dataset per number) and grant Manage dataset. One number means one dataset, so tick them all if you run several numbers.
Save.

Both are needed: the ad account decides whether we may report at all, the dataset decides where the report is written. Granting only one usually ends in the same error.

Nothing to press on the WACO side afterwards. We retry on our own at least every two hours, and once the permission is visible the conversions that were held are sent too.

Your leads are not lost while you wait. Held conversions stay stored and go out automatically once access lands. The limit comes from Meta: an ad click can only be reported for 7 days after the click. The sooner the permission is in place, the more complete the report.

If the message is not #270

"dataset has no WhatsApp Business account linked" or "whatsapp_business_account_id isn't the WhatsApp Business account linked to the dataset" — you entered your own Dataset ID in the advanced option and it is a website pixel dataset, not a WhatsApp-linked one. Clear the Dataset ID field to go back to the automatic WACO dataset and save.
"The ctwa_clid parameter is invalid" on the test button — that is the healthy answer. The test deliberately uses a fake click id, and Meta checks its authenticity last, after the token, dataset and payload have all been accepted.
Conversions recorded but zero in Events Manager — check that the chats really came from ads. Only conversations born from an ad click carry a click id, and only those can be reported.

Seeing each number's dataset

The Ads page lists Dataset per number. Each WhatsApp Business account has its own dataset, so if you run several numbers you will see several dataset ids in Events Manager. Use that list to match a number to its id when your ads team goes looking.

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Still stuck after following this guide? Contact us from the dashboard — attach a screenshot if you have one, it speeds everything up.