Cod to Prepaid (sms)

Converting Cash-on-Delivery (COD) orders to prepaid orders is a powerful strategy in e-commerce to reduce Return-to-Origin (RTO) rates and increase prepaid revenue. With ConvertWay’s automation, you can seamlessly encourage customers to prepay after placing a COD order—ensuring better margins and customer commitment.


Why Convert COD Orders to Prepaid?

Reduce RTOs: Prepaid orders have a significantly lower return rate compared to COD orders, helping you save on reverse logistics costs.

Boost Revenue: Offer discounts or cashback on prepaid conversions to increase prepaid adoption and overall profitability.


How to Enable COD to Prepaid Automation?

ConvertWay provides an COD to Prepaid Flow, enabling you to automatically send WhatsApp or SMS messages to customers with secure payment links. Based on the customer’s action, the order status is updated, and a tag is added to your Shopify dashboard.


How It Works:-

  1. Order placement:-

A customer places a COD order via Shopify or any supported 3rd-party checkout.

  1. Automation trigger:-

The system automatically sends the customer a WhatsApp message with a secure payment link, encouraging them to pay and switch to prepaid.

  1. Customer completes payment:-

Once payment is made

• The original COD order is cancelled and tagged: CW-converted to prepaid #new_order_id

• A new prepaid order is created with the same products, customer details, and shipping address, tagged: CW-prepaid from #old_order_id

• Prior discounts are combined with the “COD to Prepaid discount”, and all discount details along with any extra information from the old order, are added to the notes section of the new prepaid order

• The new created order is marked as Paid

  1. Tracking & tags:-

Cancelled COD orders appear as Cancelled, and new prepaid orders appear as Paid, making them easy to track inside your dashboard.


Steps to Activate:-

Step 1) Navigate to: Flows > SMS > COD to Prepaid


Trigger Options: For the COD to Prepaid flow, you can choose between two trigger options:

COD to Prepaid (Order Placed):- Triggered automatically when a new COD order is created.

OR

COD Confirmed via COD Flow:- Triggered when a customer clicks “Confirm Order” in the existing "COD & Address Flow".

(Prerequisite: The COD & Address Flow must be activated for this option to work.)




Step 2) Configure flow setting:

  • While saving trigger, grant Permission "write order edits" to convertway.
  • Razorpay payment configuration need to be done to receive the payment link.
  • Trigger Delay: When to send the followup messages after the order is placed.

((We recommend keeping this delay shorter than your usual order fulfillment time.

For example: If your team typically ships or dispatches orders within 24 hours, set the follow-up delay to something less than 24 hours to ensure the message reaches the customer in time.)


  • Link Expiry Time: How long the payment link remains valid.

(The expiry countdown starts from the moment the message is sent to the customer.)


  • Order Tagging: On prepaid conversation “TCW COD to Prepaid” tag updated in your Shopify dashboard.


Condition check before sending the 2nd followup :-

The follow-up message is sent only if the order is unpaid and unfulfilled. Before triggering the flow, we check the order status — if the order is already fulfilled or paid, the message will not be sent.



Step 3) Steps to create template for "COD to prepaid" :-

Templates--> "Sms or whatsapp template --> Flows {category} ---> Cod to prepaid {Subcategory}

The created templates will be shown in the respective template section.




Step 4) Navigate to analytics :-

Flows > COD to Prepaid > Analytics



Keypoint to Remember:-

  • The COD-to-Prepaid feature works only with Shopify’s native checkout. If you’re using a third-party checkout, it may not work. This happens when the third party prevents COD orders from being edited — in such cases, we cannot apply the discount or send related messages.
  • Before triggering any followup, we are checking the order status — if the order is already fulfilled, the message will not be sent.


Keypoint to Remember:-

  1. No unnecessary notifications

To keep the customer experience simple, we avoid sending redundant WhatsApp messages.

No cancellation message is sent for the old COD order.

No confirmation message is sent for the new prepaid order.

👉 This way, customers only receive the updates that matter, without any confusion.


  1. If COD orders contain shipping charges

If a COD order has shipping charges, they stay the same and carry over to the prepaid order.


  1. Smart follow-up control

Before sending any follow-up message, we check the order status.If the order is already fulfilled, no follow-up is sent.

👉 This ensures customers don’t receive irrelevant or unnecessary reminders.


Start Converting COD to Prepaid & Increase Profits with ConvertWay!

Protect your business from unnecessary RTOs and boost your margins using our seamless COD to Prepaid SMS flow.


→ Enable it today from your ConvertWay Dashboard!



Updated on: 18/09/2025

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