This situation might be unique to us, but is actually creating tremendous problems for us.

-- First problem

Any new order created in the backend by an admin will have the order status "NEW", so the email that automatically gets sent out will also have the order status as "NEW.

In our old system, we were able to change the status before saving in insert mode, AbleCommerce doesn't work this way.

Why this is a problem for us?

We deal with a lot of quotes, and accounting departments like to see the word quote on the order tickets. In order for us to do this today, we need to tell the customer disregard the first email with the status new, and you will get a second email with the status quote.

Our old system also had the ability to prevent an email from going out per order basis. In other words, as an admin is creating a new order, there is a check box on the upper right that says, "Do not notify customer on saving". I think this would be a wonderful feature.

-- Second problem

In order to work around this, I told my people to go ahead and insert a prefix of "xxx-" in front of the customer's email when placing a new order. This was a big mistake for the following reasons. Besides the tremendous error messages that I get in the background from AbleCommerce, the original email is copied over to the shipping table, and there is no direct way to modify this email after it's been copied on an insert.

As a future request, when editing shipping details, you must also provide the shipping email so a user can change it if necessary.

As of today, to work around this problem, we have created a payment type of "This is a quote - valid for 15 days". When the customer gets the email, even though the status is new, under the payment it shows, "This is a quote - valid for 15 days".

So far, this has worked for us, but we like the idea of being able to block an email from the default email trigger at the order level.

Just my thoughts

Edited by user Tuesday, March 15, 2022 9:20:55 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Thank you for your response, we were aware of this and this did not work for us. We always must have an email copy to determine what the original order looks like, so the above would not work.

Here is the part that I would like AbleCommerce to reevaluate. We do not have the ability to change the order status in insert mode, and that's the problem. Instead of looking at it order from a new status perspective, AbleCommerce should be looking at the order from an insert mode perspective.

Remember that an order can only be in insert mode once, but in edit mode multiple times. So the triggers which are set to new orders status would be better suited they were set to insert mode status, and we would have the ability to save an order in insert mode using whatever order status we wish, not just "NEW".

Appreciate the feedback, and I hope you appreciate mine.

-Ray

Edited by user Friday, March 18, 2022 11:34:49 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

The answer would be yes for both the let me explain in a bit more detail to give you a better perspective.

#1. The ability to suppress an email to the customer (regardless of order status)

There are many times when we are manipulating an order for many reasons, where certain triggers execute, and emails are sent out, sometimes you need to manipulate an order let's say five times within a short timeframe. It doesn't look professional if a customer gets hit with five different emails in a short amount of time, and could actually trigger a spam filter protection on his end. Sometimes these changes are very small, and a customer does not need to be aware of it by getting an email every time.

Please note that the ability to suppress an email is only from the customer's point of view, if you have an entry for BB (blind copy), that email should always execute.

It is imperative to us to always maintain a copy of the original order insert ("NEW") status for our records. Sometimes one of my people just makes a serious blunder, and having a copy of the original order helps tremendously.

Our old system had a checkbox in the backend, in the order header that read "No Email sent to Customer", this checkbox would reset itself every time you would reopen the order.

This checkbox would override any triggers set, and instead of the code looking for a not true value, it would check the status of the checkbox.

#2. The ability to save a NEW order with a different status

Right now because the coding, your "NEW" status and insert mode are interconnected, they are locked together. It just might be beneficial not only for myself, but the many others, if this would become unlocked, and an admin in the backend processing a brand-new order (insert mode) would be able to change the status to something different before saving. This not only would print and get stamped on an email, but it also prevents the user from having to go back in and edit the newly created order just for the purpose of changing it status.

I know this may not seem like a lot, but when you're dealing with a lot of orders on a daily basis, it is time-consuming.

All the triggers which are set to "NEW" order would still execute, it's just that they're executing now based on the table being in insert mode, and not an order set to "NEW" status.

I hope this more detailed explanation helps.
-Ray

Edited by user Friday, March 18, 2022 12:37:21 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified