Are you Missing Shopify Payments Payouts?

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Keeping track of your  Shopify Payments payouts can be a challenge at times, especially if you have a store with a high volume of incoming orders and payouts arriving every day. It is not common for payouts to go missing, there is usually another issue at play here! We’ll go through the payout process below, as well as some common issues that are often mistaken for missing payouts.

View Payouts

The first thing you should do if you believe a payout is missing is to view the payout section of your Shopify admin. This can be accessed by clicking on Settings > Payments, then under the Shopify Payments section, you can click View Payouts. The Payouts page will show you your previous and next payout, so you can see clearly what funds are on the way and when they will be sent. If you have scheduled your payouts (we'll go into scheduled payouts in the next section!), then you see the estimated date that you get paid. You can see the available balance for your next payout and any funds held in reserve.

Pay Period

Your pay period is the term that refers to the time between when your customer places an order in your store, and the time the funds from that order are sent to your bank account. Your pay period will depend on your location; different countries have different payout times. For example, if you are based in Australia there will be a waiting period of 2 business days before your payout is sent to you, but in Singapore, it will be 4 business days. The full list of pay periods is here for you to look over.

When we talk about business days, we mean Monday to Friday; if you get an order on Friday that is business day number 1, the next business day will then be Monday. Any orders taken on a Friday, Saturday or Sunday will be grouped together and sent as one payout.

It’s a good idea to check your pay period first before you begin to worry or contact our support team to report a missing payout. Once the payout is sent to you, it may then take a further 24-72 hours for your banking institution to process those funds, depending on their processing times. 

A good way to manage your payouts is to schedule when they are sent to you. You can decide to schedule your payouts once per week, or once per month. As a default setting, payouts are sent to you every business day as soon as the funds are available, but if you’d like to have them come to you at a set time so you can track them better, scheduling your payouts may be a better option for you.

Payout Statuses

There are three payout statuses that you will see on the payout page - Paid, Failed or In Transit. Let’s break this down a little further for some extra context:

• Paid: This means Shopify has transferred the payout to your bank account. At this point, we have no means to stop or re-route the payout. This does not mean that the funds have been deposited - the payout is now subject to your bank's processing times. It is possible that paid payouts can still be returned to us as failed.
• Failed: This status means that the bank has rejected the transaction associated with a payout. There can be many explanations for a failed payout; incorrect bank account, insufficient funds for a debit, etc. The details of this will be displayed in a banner on the failed payout. Check out our Help Centre article that goes into more details on failed payouts.
• In Transit: The In Transit status means that a transfer has been set up and routed to the bank account on file. Updating bank account details while a payout is in transit will not change where the payout is routed. This status can occur in advance of the payout date.

While you can contact our support team at any time if you do believe a payout is missing, we would ask you to wait 10 business days between when the payout has been paid, and the funds not showing up in your account. After those 10 days have passed, we can be sure that it is not a processing delay with the funds or a failed payout, and we can investigate fully by tracing their progress to your account.

A Trace ID can be used to track down a payout that you believe you have not received, but it shows in our system as paid.

Note: The paid date in the admin does not reflect the date that the payout will be deposited into your bank account. It's important to remember that when a payout is marked as paid in the admin, it is still subject to bank processing times depending on your bank.

Missing Payouts

If a payout does not deposit successfully, the best thing to do is check if your banking information is correct within the Shopify admin. You can do this by going to Settings > Payments > Manage, where you should be able to see the last 2 digits of your bank account and the banking institution. It’s important to note here that we do not keep your banking information on file, we only have access to the last 2 digits of the account number. This is to ensure your details are kept secure.

The payout is generally returned to our Shopify accounts as failed within a number of business days if the account details are correct. Payouts can take up to 10 business days to return as failed, which is why it is best to wait to be sure the payout is not missing. 

If we're still showing the payout as 'Paid' after 7 business days, this means that the bank has not returned the funds to Shopify, but also that you still may not have received it yet either. In these scenarios, it could be that the bank may be holding funds, is waiting to deposit the funds into an active account at your request, or it has gone to incorrect banking details.

Trace ID's

After the 10 day time frame has passed where the payout would have come back as failed, we can then provide you with a Trace ID. The Trace ID will provide you with information such as settlement date, amount, and currency; all of this information will help your bank locate missing payouts. We are able to provide all of that information, along with the trace ID, if requested.

When reaching out to your bank about a missing payout, request to speak with the ACH or Transfers department; they will likely have the ability to search for a specific transfer.

In most cases, the payout is indeed in the right place, but the bank has yet to populate it on your statement, which can lead to confusion. Usually, you may just have to wait for a little time to pass and before the funds are visible on your statement.