How an order flows through Lodsted

From the moment a customer checks out to the moment Shopify shows a tracking number. Read this once and every other page will make sense.

1. The order arrives: status Downloaded

   A customer places order #1042 in your store. Shopify sends Lodsted a webhook, and Lodsted also runs a scheduled sync (every 15 minutes while orders are flowing, backing off to every 4 hours when the store is quiet; the Sync button in the title bar runs one now). The order appears on the Orders page with status Downloaded.

   On the way in Lodsted creates any SKU it has not seen before, expands kit SKUs into their components, flags priority orders, and adds a VIP tag that records store and month (for example v:M26J). If the store has a fulfillment hold on the order, or its ship-to address cannot go on a domestic US label (outside the US, a US territory, a military APO/FPO address, or no zip), it arrives as On Hold instead.

2. Can it ship? Backorder check

   Lodsted compares every line against available stock at active locations (on hand minus what is already allocated to waves), older orders first. An order short on any line is tagged backordered, in Lodsted and in Shopify, and shown under the Backordered chip and on the dashboard. It stays Downloaded until stock is received; the tag stays for good, as a record, even once it can ship. Digital products, gift cards and other non-shippable SKUs are ignored here and everywhere downstream.

3. A wave picks it up: status In Wave

   Someone on the Waves page clicks a wave definition, say Standard shipping, reviews the eligible orders and clicks Create. Definitions are tried in the order they are listed, so an order goes to the first definition that wants it; within a definition Lodsted takes orders oldest first, and for each one reserves stock from its primary pick location first, then other pick locations, then bulk. An order is taken only if every shippable line can be filled (orders tagged split may be taken in parts).

   Orders are grouped into waves of the definition's cart size (up to 250 bins). Order #1042 becomes wave W317, bin 12. If a pick bin did not have enough and bulk did, Lodsted also creates an auto-move listing what to carry from bulk to the pick bin before picking starts.

4. Print: status Printed

   Clicking Print on the wave opens one document: the pick list (sorted by location, each line says how many go to which bins) followed by one packing slip per order (sorted by bin, with the pick location next to each line). The first print moves the orders to Printed and adds the tags printed and W317/12 to the order in Shopify so your team can see it there too. Printing again later does not change anything.

5. Pick and pack

   The picker walks the pick list and drops items into the numbered bins. The packer takes bin 12, matches it to the packing slip for #1042, boxes it and puts the slip in. The barcode on the slip is the shipment id, {order id}-1; a second shipment of a split order would be -2.

6. Buy the label

   At the pack station the packer scans the shipment id, the scale fills in the weight, a box preset fills in the dimensions, and Buy label purchases postage (USPS or UPS through your Stamps.com account, or Shopify Shipping for a Shopify order) and prints it. Lodsted writes a shipment record with the tracking number, weight and cost, status Pending.

   Shipments can also be imported from another shipping program with Add Shipment.

7. Shipment processing: status Shipped

   During the next sync (or when someone clicks Process Shipments) Lodsted processes every pending shipment in two phases. Phase 1, inside the database: deduct the stock from the bins it was picked from, oldest cost layer first, write a sale transaction for each, mark the lines shipped, and when every line has shipped set the order to Shipped. Phase 2, afterwards: tell the store. For Shopify that is a fulfillment with the tracking number, which triggers the customer's shipping notification; if the payment was only authorized, it is captured now.

   The two phases are separate on purpose. The box has already left, so stock must come off even if Shopify is slow or rejects the call. A failed push is retried on later cycles and shown on the Shipments page until it succeeds or someone dismisses it.

8. The wave completes

   When every order on wave W317 has shipped (or been canceled, or had its remaining lines removed), the wave becomes Completed and any stock still reserved for it is released. Lodsted then rebuilds its allocation counts and emails the Admin alert address if anything drifted.

9. End of day

   On the pack station's Recent tab, USPS Manifest creates one SCAN form per ship type for today's USPS labels. The driver scans the one barcode and every package is accepted at once. The Dashboard shows the day's shipped count and value.

Side paths

Holds

An order can be put On Hold by a person (the hold button on the Orders page, only while it is Downloaded), by Shopify (a fulfillment hold, tagged shopify-hold), or by Lodsted when the ship-to address cannot go on a domestic US label (tagged ship-to-hold, with an email to the Shipping alert list). Held orders are skipped by waves. Restore puts a manual hold back to Downloaded; a Shopify hold releases itself when the store releases it; a ship-to hold releases itself when the address is corrected in Shopify, or with Restore. See Ship-to address holds.

Cancellations

Cancel or fully refund the order in Shopify. On the next sync Lodsted marks it Cancelled. If it was already on a wave, the packing slip shows it and the wave can still complete around it.

The customer changed the order after it was waved

An order that is In Wave or Printed is frozen: Lodsted does not apply the change. It adds the tag changed, records what changed in the order's Activity tab, emails the Shipping alert addresses with the order, wave, bin and the differences, and the pack station shows the current lines and asks the packer to confirm against the tote before buying the label. If the change matters, remove the order from the wave (it goes to On Hold), restore it, and let the next wave pick it up fresh. See Changes after waving.

Split orders

Tag an order split in Shopify (or in Lodsted) and it may ship in several shipments: a wave takes the lines it can fill, the rest wait for stock, and after the first shipment the order drops back to Downloaded until the remaining lines are waved. Each shipment has its own id (-1, -2) and packing slip.

Not enough on the shelf at ship time

Shipping never refuses. If the bin is physically short, the deduction clamps at zero, a shortfall transaction records the gap, the shipment shows a ! on the Shipments page, and an Inventory alert email lists every shortfall from that run so someone can count the bin.

Status reference