We are experiencing a very serious Cloudflare issue that is hurting our business, and I want to understand how Shopify will address this.
What happened:
We run multiple Shopify stores selling tools/jewelry/coins and receive traffic from Google Ads, Facebook Ads, and other paid channels.
Twice within a short period, Cloudflare completely blocked the ability to purchase.
Customers reported:
They could not checkout
They could not insert shipping address
“Buy Now” button not working
Page stuck or error
Could not proceed to payment.
Impact on our business:
We spent ad money driving customers to a checkout that didn’t function.
We received multiple customer complaints by email.
We lost sales.
Some customers actually paid (money was withdrawn from their bank), but no orders appeared in Shopify because Cloudflare broke that stage of the checkout.
These customers are upset, and we have to manually resolve their cases.
We really need help understanding:
Why this is happening?
How to prevent this in the future?
How Shopify compensates merchants for operational damage?
Our expectation:
Cloudflare outage prevented normal store operations, caused financial loss, and created customer-service issues.
Given the scale of disruption, we think at least two years of free Shopify subscription would be a fair compensation.
We are not asking for something unreasonable — we simply want Shopify to recognize the damage and provide a meaningful solution.
Evidence we can provide if needed:
Customer complaint messages
Requests for refunds
Screenshots showing checkout failure
Payments received but no matching Shopify orders
Ad analytics from the days Cloudflare was not functioning
This situation is extremely stressful for us and unfair considering that we did not cause the problem. We pay Shopify to ensure checkout availability, stability, and customer trust.
I kindly request Shopify Support to review our case and respond with a clear direction.
However, talking about reasonable:
say, on a Plus plan it’s US$2300+/month, so 2 years would be ~$55 200.
For Advanced – ~$9 576;
Even on a “Grow” 2 years would be us$2500.
Are those commensurable with the actual documented losses?
Also, it’s helpful to read paragraphs 7.1, 7.4, 7.5 and others of Shopify Terms of Service - Shopify …
Stores on Plus may have an SLA, but not 100% sure about this.
I doubt relevant people at Shopify monitor this forum.
Yelling in a box and going now where with it in the public park.
Location Location Location, know where you are etc etc ad nauseum.
These are the PEER TO PEER forums, shopify’s all but pulled stakes and 4/5 replies will just be bots telling you what you want to hear to no effect or outright misinformtion.
ATDS Checkout Throttling Bug – 10-Year Shopify Store – 0 Orders for Hours – No TMS Response (4+ Days)I am a 10-year Shopify merchant and my store has been experiencing a severe recurring checkout failure for the past 3 months.Orders suddenly stop for 6–12 hours at a time despite confirmed high traffic.This has happened repeatedly and only resolves when a Shopify support advisor or staff member opens my store admin indicating an issue with Shopify’s Automated Traffic Defense System (ATDS) or rate-limiting.
I absolutely understand that Shopify won’t hand out compensation just because someone asks.
Our point here is:
The outage was not caused by us.
Cloudflare failure blocked checkout functionality.
We kept paying for ads and operational expenses while the checkout was non-functional.
We have documented losses.
Customers are reporting failed attempts to purchase
Customers charged, but no order created
Required manual support to fix confusion
Ad spend wasted (Google, Facebook)
Lost conversions during high traffic windows
We cannot quantify the exact multiplier of long-term reputation damage, but there was measurable direct loss.
We are asking for reasonable recognition, not “free money.”
The suggested period (2 years) is an initial negotiation anchor, not a demand or ultimatum.
If Shopify proposes an alternative solution, we’re open to discussing.
Terms of Service:
Yes, we’re familiar with the limitations (7.1 etc.)
But Cloudflare was not a small glitch; it effectively disabled a core component of the platform.
The responsibility chain is Shopify → Cloudflare → Merchant.
From our side, we expect Shopify, as the platform owner, to mediate.
This post is not meant to escalate.
It is to:
Gather experiences from other merchants
Look for feedback
Trigger appropriate escalation through Shopify channels
Thanks for sharing - it looks extremely similar to what we experienced.Your mention of ATDS / rate-limiting might be related - because Shopify systems don’t differentiate between malicious traffic and paid traffic from ads.
It looks like:
Shopify’s automated filters are throttling legitimate buyers.
This means merchants are losing income, and customers have a terrible experience.
Have Shopify provided you with any technical explanation yet, or escalated internally?
I’m experiencing the exact same issue described by you and others.Soem people are here to often defend Shopify aggressively and they try to push merchants away from discussing real problems publicly.I am 10 years old merchant
My store normally gets steady orders throughout the day, but for the past few days all orders suddenly arrive only between specific hours (around 3 PM – 8 PM). Outside these hours, the store is active with high traffic but receives zero orders, even though ads are running and customers report failed checkout attempts.
This is not a business-hour pattern or customer behavior issue. It appears to be the same type of checkout throttling / ATDS-triggered blockage mentioned above. Once the time window passes, orders resume normally.
To be clear:
Traffic is real and high.
Add-to-cart is working.
Checkout failure is silent — customers do not see an error screen.
This started suddenly without any theme or app changes.
Other merchants reporting identical symptoms means this is likely a Shopify-side or Cloudflare-side issue, not an isolated store configuration error. We are requesting Shopify Support to escalate and review ATDS or checkout logs for the affected period.
We aren’t here to point fingers — we just need acknowledgment that the issue exists so it can be fixed. Nothing improves unless it’s documented publicly.
Thank you to the merchants sharing their experiences. It helps all of us get closer to a resolution.
Hi i am fellow merchant like you and facing same issues, i just found that going on cloudfare radar and analysing my website and that will give you techncial detail about malicious attacks triggering as risk causing checkout failures and throttling for several hours. And it needs to be sorted only by shopify techncial team. But sharing those issue here can help other merchants to find a way !
ATDS Checkout Throttling Bug – 10-Year Shopify Store – 0 Orders for Hours – No TMS Response (4+ Days)I am a 10-year Shopify merchant and my store has been experiencing a severe recurring checkout failure for the past 3 months.Orders suddenly stop for 6–12 hours at a time despite confirmed high traffic.This has happened repeatedly and only resolves when a Shopify support advisor or staff member opens my store admin indicating an issue with Shopify’s Automated Traffic Defense System (ATDS) or rate-limiting.