The short answer: 900 to 1,200 messages for a 300-customer wash
A single-branch car wash with about 300 enrolled customers, running Waya's four automatic triggers plus one scheduled campaign a month, typically sends somewhere between 900 and 1,200 wallet messages a month — well inside Growth's 5,000-message allowance and nowhere close to needing a top-up.
That estimate covers welcome-on-enrollment, stamp-added, reward-redeemed, and 14-day win-back triggers, plus one broadcast campaign. Geofence messages don't count toward this budget at all, since they cost zero message quota.
Where the messages actually come from
Breaking the 900-1,200 estimate down by trigger shows why stamp-added messages, not campaigns, dominate the total for a busy wash.
| Message type | Trigger | Estimated sends / month |
|---|---|---|
| Welcome | On enrollment | ~30 (new signups) |
| Stamp added | Every scan | ~400 (scans across the base) |
| Reward redeemed | On redemption | ~50 |
| Win-back | 14 days inactive, deduped 30 days | ~120 |
| Scheduled campaign | One broadcast a month | ~300 (sent to an active segment) |
Building your own estimate
Six steps rebuild this estimate around your own enrolled base and scanning volume, rather than the 300-customer example above.
- Count enrolled customers
This sets the ceiling for welcome and win-back message volume.
- Estimate scans per month
Every scan can trigger a stamp-added message, so this is usually the largest single line item.
- Add redemptions
Fewer than scans, since a reward is redeemed far less often than a stamp is added.
- Add win-back sends
Roughly the share of your base that's been quiet for 14+ days, deduped so nobody gets it twice in 30 days.
- Add planned campaigns
One-off broadcasts to an active segment, sized to whichever audience you target.
- Sum and compare to your plan
Total against Free's 100, Growth's 5,000, or Premium's unlimited allowance.
Why geofence messages don't count against this budget
Geofence puts a message on a customer's lock screen when their phone is near the branch — Apple Wallet only, up to 10 branch locations per card, radius 50-500 meters, default 150 m — and it costs zero message quota because it isn't a wallet-message send in the same sense as a trigger or campaign. A wash relying heavily on geofence for proximity nudges can run those messages as often as makes sense without touching the 900-1,200 figure above at all.
That makes geofence the cheapest lever in the whole notification toolkit, worth setting up from the Branches screen even on a tight message budget.
When a wash needs more than Growth's 5,000
Most single-branch washes never come close to the 5,000-message ceiling, but a handful of scenarios push past it — see the full break-even math for how a heavier message spend still compares against plan cost.
- A busy multi-branch wash running frequent campaigns across 3 branches on Growth
- A wash sending a stamp-added message on every single scan at high daily volume
- A wash running scheduled campaigns weekly instead of monthly
- Any wash approaching Growth's limit should compare a top-up (5 SAR for 500 messages) against Premium's unlimited messages
Fitting a message budget into the Free plan
On Free, the 100-message-a-month allowance is tight for anything beyond the automatic triggers on a small base — a wash with 60-80 enrolled customers can usually cover welcome and win-back messages within that limit, but should skip broadcast campaigns until moving to Growth. Sending too often on a small allowance risks running out mid-month before the win-back trigger, the one message type most directly tied to return rate, gets a chance to fire.
One limit that shapes this whole budget
Every message counted above goes to the wallet lock screen — there's no SMS channel on Waya. And because there's no POS or till integration, stamp-added messages only fire off the back of an actual staff scan on an ordinary phone, so a wash with a scanning gap will see a smaller message count than this page estimates, which is itself a signal worth noticing.
Frequently asked questions
How many wallet messages does a typical car wash send per month?
A 300-customer car wash running all four automatic triggers plus one campaign typically sends 900 to 1,200 messages a month, comfortably within Growth's 5,000-message allowance.
Do geofence messages count toward the monthly message limit?
No. Geofence costs zero message quota regardless of how often it fires, since it isn't counted the same way as a trigger or campaign send.
What happens if a car wash exceeds its monthly message allowance?
Top-ups are available from the in-app Store: 500 messages for 5 SAR, 1,000 for 10 SAR, or unlimited for 20 SAR, useful for an unusually busy month without upgrading plans.
Is 100 messages a month enough on the Free plan?
It covers welcome and win-back triggers for a small base of 60-80 customers, but leaves little room for broadcast campaigns — most washes outgrow it around the same time they outgrow the 100-customer cap.
Does Waya send any messages by SMS?
No. There is no SMS channel — every message, trigger, and campaign in this budget goes to the wallet lock screen on Apple Wallet or Google Wallet.