Recovering abandoned carts

How a left-behind cart is spotted

Your store quietly notices when a customer reaches checkout with a cart but never places the order — so you get a real chance to win the sale back.

• The checkout must have a valid 10-digit mobile number. Customers sign in with their mobile before the checkout opens, so the number is already there for almost everyone; the cart is saved when they type or change it, or leave the page. No phone, no way to reach them, so nothing is saved.
• We wait 15 minutes before calling a cart "abandoned" — they might still be paying. Only quiet carts show up.
• There's one entry per customer. If they come back and try checkout again, the same entry simply updates with their latest cart.
• The page shows the last 30 days by default — switch with the small 7d, 30d and 90d buttons beside the pills.

The cart list — who left, and what it's worth

Open Abandoned Carts under Sales in your site's dashboard menu — a small badge shows how many carts are waiting right now.

Four cards at the top give you the money picture at a glance:

Each cart card shows the customer's name and phone, what's in the cart (with size or colour if they picked one), the cart value, and how long ago they left. A small chip tells you where things stand: Waiting, Contacted ×2 (with a log of when you tried), or Recovered. Use the pills on top — each shows a live count — to switch between Waiting, 💳 Tried to pay, Contacted, Recovered and All. Carts that tried to pay float to the top of every list.

Dashboard → Abandoned carts

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1. 1One tapOpens WhatsApp with a written message ready to send.

💳 “Tried to pay” — your hottest leads

Some customers go further than leaving a cart: they tap Pay online, reach the payment page — and the payment never completes (UPI timeout, closed the app, changed their mind at the bank screen). These are the hottest leads you have: they already decided to buy.

The 💳 Tried to pay pill shows exactly these people, with a red chip on the card telling you which payment method they opened, when, and how many times they tried. The one-tap WhatsApp follow-up works the same as any cart — and if they later pay (any way at all), the card flips to Recovered automatically. If a customer changes their cart and tries again, it stays ONE card — never duplicates.

UPI QR customers show here too. When a customer opens your UPI payment sheet and no order follows, the card says Opened UPI QR with the amount they were asked to pay and the 6-letter payment note written into the QR. They may already have paid: look in your UPI app for that amount and note. If the money is there, the WhatsApp button opens a ready message asking them to send the payment screenshot so you can confirm the order (you can edit it before sending).

Winning a cart back on WhatsApp — one tap

The follow-up message is already written for you — with the customer's name, their items, the total, and a link straight to your checkout — so recovering a cart takes seconds.

Your default message — set it once

The ready-made message comes from a default you control, so every follow-up sounds like your shop without retyping anything.

In the message preview, tap Edit default message, write it your way and tap Save (only the owner or a manager can change it). Drop in these placeholders — they fill in automatically for each customer:

• {name} — the customer's name  ·  {items} — what's in their cart
• {total} — the cart value  ·  {store} — your store name  ·  {link} — your checkout link

Recovered value — proof the follow-up works

The Recovered card exists to answer one question honestly: did messaging actually bring money back?

When a customer you contacted places an order — even days later — their cart flips to Recovered and its value is added to the "came back" total. We match by phone number, so it counts even if they order different items than what was in the cart. Carts that converted without you messaging aren't counted as recovered — that credit isn't yours to claim, so the number you see is real.

Once the order lands, handle it like any other — see Managing orders.

The automatic reminder — recovery while you sleep

If you've switched on customer notifications, your store can also nudge cart-leavers automatically — free, and with no work from you.

In your dashboard, open Notifications and turn on Customer notifications, then Remind customers who left a cart. From then on:

• About an hour after someone leaves a cart, they get a friendly notification on their phone — "your cart is waiting" — that opens your checkout.
• It goes only to customers who accepted notifications from your store, and only once per cart — never a barrage.
• The automatic reminder doesn't touch your Contacted numbers — those stay yours, so your recovery rate reflects your own WhatsApp effort.

More on how customers subscribe and what else you can send: Customer notifications.

Good manners — and a few limits

A cart follow-up is welcome when it feels like helpful service, and annoying when it feels like chasing — a little etiquette keeps customers happy.

• One friendly message is usually enough. The card shows "Tried ×2 · last 3h ago" so you never accidentally message the same person twice in an hour.
• Message at a sensible hour — an 11 pm "you forgot your cart!" rarely lands well.
• Offer help, not pressure. "Facing any trouble with payment?" recovers more carts than "BUY NOW".
• Done with a cart? Tap ⋯ → Dismiss — it's handled to take it off your to-do lists. If you had messaged it, it stays visible under Contacted with a Closed tag (your follow-up history is never lost); otherwise find it under All. One tap reopens it.
• Phone numbers are private customer data. Only you and staff you've given the Orders permission can see this page.