Shopify Flow not recognizing empty tags in customer

Shopify Apps

Topic summary

A bug exists in Shopify Flow where the condition “Tags items is empty or does not exist” fails to properly evaluate empty customer tags.

The Issue:

  • When a new customer places their first order (with no existing tags), Flow incorrectly evaluates the empty tags condition as False
  • This prevents intended actions from triggering, such as sending ID verification emails
  • On subsequent orders, the condition works correctly because tags are no longer empty

Shopify’s Response:
Support confirmed this is a known limitation of the Shopify Flow app, though the technical reason remains unclear. They indicated the issue has been escalated to the backend team for potential future improvements.

Current Status:
No resolution or workaround provided. One user plans to use the Mechanic app as an alternative automation solution to bypass this limitation.

Summarized with AI on November 2. AI used: claude-sonnet-4-5-20250929.
1

We have set a flow when an order is created to check if the customer has a specific tag associated (ID verification completed). If the customer is not verified, then an ID verification email is sent. If not, the order is processed.

The problem we are facing is that when a user places an order for the first time, moment in which the customer is created, the tags are empty but somehow Shopify evaluates the second condition to False, therefore not sending the ID verification email. If the customer then places a second order, the Flow will trigger the ID verification email, because tags are now not empty.

The problem arises when there are no tags in the customer. Somehow the condition of “Tags items is empety or does not exists” is not working.

Has anyone faced this issue/bug?

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2

I have the same problem as you. I wrote to support, and they told me that this is a limitation of the Shopify Flow app.
I really don’t understand what the limitations of checking for empty fields for tags can be.
They promised to contact the Shopify Flow backend team to discuss potential improvements in the future.

1 Like
3

Bummer. Thanks for reporting this! I guess I’ll create an automation in Mechanic to do this instead.