Issue with Pickup and Stock Transfer Not Triggering as Expected

Payments + Shipping & Fulfilment
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Topic summary

Users report that Shopify’s stock transfer feature for in-store pickup isn’t functioning as expected. When inventory is out of stock at the primary pickup location, customers cannot select that location for pickup, despite enabling the setting to transfer inventory from other locations.

Current behavior:

  • Shopify displays “Pickup currently unavailable” on product pages when the primary location lacks stock
  • The transfer feature doesn’t allow customers to place pickup orders that would trigger automatic inventory transfers

Shopify Support response:

  • Confirmed the feature works at checkout but not on product pages due to an internal issue
  • Updated support documentation acknowledging that transfers and product page pickup messages don’t work together
  • Mentioned a full store pickup module/app is in development with no ETA

Workarounds identified:

  • Modify “unavailable” language to inform customers they can still select pickup at checkout if item can be added to cart
  • Create a $0.00 shipping rate labeled “pickup in-store” with all locations enabled, allowing Shopify to fulfill from any location

Status: Issue remains unresolved with no timeline for a proper fix.

Summarized with AI on October 31. AI used: claude-sonnet-4-5-20250929.
1

Hi,

I’m currently offering in-store pickup at my primary location and I have another location opening soon. I’ve enabled the option to transfer inventory from one location to another when a product is out of stock at the selected pickup location. In settings → shipping and delivery → pickup in store → my primary location → store transfers (Transfer inventory from the selected locations to primary location when it’s out of stock) checkbox ticked to yes.

The expectation is that if an item is out of stock at primary location, customers should still be able to select pickup from that location, and Shopify will automatically initiate a stock transfer?

The issue:

  • Despite enabling the stock transfer option, customers are unable to select pickup at primary location if that location is out of stock. Shopify shows the message “Pickup currently unavailable at primary location.”
  • This behaviour contradicts my understanding of the stock transfer feature, which I expected would allow customers to place pickup orders at primary location even when inventory needs to be transferred from the other location.

Is there a way to configure this so that customers can always choose in-store pickup at the primary location?

2

Were you able to find some resolution to this? I contacted shopify support and got this reply but haven’t received a resolution. I’m just wondering if I can solve this issue for myself:

Just reaching out to you in relation to the Local Pickup option issue you are experiencing on the product page.

Thanks very much for all the information you provided as it was a great help during our investigation.
Looks like as discussed in the initial chat that the local pickup is working at the checkout stage just due to an internal issue it’s not showing as available on the product page level even though you have selected the stock transfer option.

I’ve reached out to one particular development team here internally for further investigation to see what is causing this, looks like it can possibly be resolved by them running a maintenance task on your store. Currently, that particular team are out of office but the moment I hear back from them, I’ll get back in touch with you.

3

Hi @brian_harrys , thanks for checking it out - I still dont have any resolution yet.

4

Thanks @benbsteven . I’m new to shopify but I hoped for better. I’ll let you know if I’m able to get a resolution from support.

5

Unfortunately I am experiencing this same issue, and have not found a proper resolution for it yet. I suspect it’s an issue with Shopify’s Store Transfers system, but my efforts to communicate that to Shopify Support don’t seem to get anywhere close to the engineering team.

I have no issues if the product is in stock at a location which has pickup instore enabled - the store transfer triggerworks. BUT if you are keeping stock at a warehouse where you want pickup instore disabled, then it won’t work.

One workaround is to create a new shipping rate for that same shipping profile, $0.00 and call it “pickup in-store” and ensure all locations are enabled. Since Shopify allows fulfillment from any location for shipping orders, it will accept the order regardless of where the stock is. Far from ideal, but it might allow you to keep trading at least.

6

The Shopify team updated their support article and mentioned that the transfers feature and the product page store pickup message don’t work together. They said that they’re working on a full store pickup module/app with better visibility for customers but there is no ETA on this. Because the checkout functionality is compatible with the transfers feature, I resolved my issue by changing the language for the “unavailable” option so that it mentions that if the item can be added to the cart, customers can choose store pickup at checkout.

1 Like
7

Same, I hope the Shopify team can solve it…