Messenger error 2018247: Insufficient permission to access user profile

Code 2018247 comes from the User Profile API, the endpoint bots call as GET /PSID?fields=first_name,last_name,profile_pic to personalize conversations. Meta's error-codes table explains it directly: "The app calling the User Profile API has not been granted the permissions needed to access one or more of the requested fields." The request shape is fine and the PSID resolves; at least one field in your fields list is beyond what the app may read.

The field tiers are the whole story. Basic profile fields, name and profile picture, are available to apps with ordinary messaging access. The extended fields (locale, timezone, gender) require additional approval, and Meta has repeatedly narrowed them over the years; requests written against older docs routinely over-ask. The failure is all-or-nothing for the call, so one ambitious field takes down the fetch of the harmless ones with it.

Two neighbors are worth separating: 2018218 ("no profile available for this user") means the person's account type cannot be profiled at all, notably Messenger accounts created with a phone number, while 2018247 means your app cannot ask for what it asked. And bare code 10 covers profile calls the app may not make at all. A bot should treat all three as degradable: profile data is decoration, and a fetch failure should never block the reply.

{
  "error": {
    "message": "(#2018247) Insufficient permission to access user profile.",
    "type": "OAuthException",
    "code": 2018247,
    "fbtrace_id": "BLBz/WZt8dN"
  }
}

Request the minimum field set your UI actually uses, and encode it in one shared constant so a single change updates every call site. Treat profile data as optional enrichment with a fallback path, and audit the field list whenever Meta announces profile-API changes. The profile API's availability rules sit in the Messenger limits reference, and the wider permission chain in the troubleshooting guide.