Customer cancellation and return requests need a prominent, real-time notification in Shopify admin and/or POS — currently these are only visible as a small indicator on the orders list, which is easily missed and is time-sensitive for merchants who need to act before an order is fulfilled.
I only found this out half an hour ago, completely by accident. Checking orders for the day after not being online and just noticed a small icon by one of them. Turned out it’s my first cancellation request in 6 years of having my store! I could have easily missed this, there was no notification, no order status on the homepage, nothing.
I’ve now addressed this with a custom flow and sorting orders by requests, but it feels like this should be highlighted as it happens, similar to how a new order gets pushed to the admin homepage, POS, app etc. This order was one of the few that were to be fulfilled by Shopify Collective, so it’s even more urgent that these requests are pushed better to ensure time is not lost.
Hope you are having a good day. Yeah, that icon is way too easy to miss.
Your flow flix is the right move.
Just make sure it’s sending you an email or push notification instantly when a request comes in.
Also, drop this is a Shopify Features request, its genuinely needs to be highlighted like new orders.
Had this exact blind spot bite a couple of stores I work with. A plain alert helps, but what’s worked better is making it triaged instead of just “a request came in”. Tie the notification to fulfillment status so you get pinged loudly only when there’s still time to act (unfulfilled or Collective orders), versus something already shipped where the path is different. Otherwise the alerts turn into noise and you start tuning them out, which is how the next one slips through.
Two tweaks to the flow you built: put the fulfillment status and the requested action right in the alert so you can judge urgency without opening the order, and route the time-sensitive ones somewhere you genuinely can’t miss. The line I keep is that the watching and sorting are automated, but the actual cancel or refund stays a human call, since that’s the part that moves money.
Thanks for the replies so far, I’ve just highlighted the issue with a chat advisor and he’s said he will pass on to the relevant teams.
Apparently if this post becomes popular that helps, which is awkward, as I don’t like asking for internet points, but if this is something that affects anyone and they would like to see a fix made by Shopify, please like the discussion and comment, it could help!
Yes, this is a real pain point and you’re definitely not alone. It’s one of those gaps that only becomes obvious when you get caught off guard by it, which is frustrating because by then it’s often too late.
Your Flow workaround is exactly the right move and honestly more people should know about it. For anyone else landing on this thread, what works well is setting a trigger for “order cancellation request created” and then firing an internal email alert or pushing a Slack or SMS notification through a connected app. You can also pair this with order tagging so your filtered views in admin stay clean and easy to scan at a glance.
For Shopify Collective specifically the urgency is even higher since fulfillment involves a third party, so if you’re using Collective I’d strongly recommend setting that Flow notification to fire immediately rather than on any kind of delay.
One more thing worth checking while you’re at it: go into Settings then Notifications and verify which staff email addresses are actually receiving order update emails. Cancellation requests should theoretically trigger something there but a lot of merchants have outdated or incomplete staff setups and end up missing it entirely.
Upvoting this as a feature request. Real time push notifications for cancellation and return requests should be treated the same as new order alerts. It’s time sensitive by definition and right now the current setup just doesn’t reflect that.
Hello there @DDMusicGeek
This is a good point, and it’s something that a lot of merchants don’t consider until it does. One way to work around this is by creating a Flow that tags an order as soon as a cancellation or return request is generated, and then use that tag to bring those orders to the front in your admin through a dedicated saved search or an automated colection. You can also combine this with email or Slack notifications using Flow actions to get requests in real time. To make it more visible in POS, I find it’s useful to have a Action Required saved search/view, as this helps bring those orders more to the forefront compared to just leaving them in the default list.
It will send an email if you set it up in Staff Notifications. My issue is I’d like to have something to trigger off of that I can put the order on Hold in our fulfillment system. It doesn’t look like there is a trigger pre-built for cancel requests in Shopify Flow (I see one for Return Request but not Cancel Request). Is there another app that has Cancel Request as a trigger?
