Reserving Inventory for Draft Orders

When creating a draft order, SHOPLINE allows you to reserve inventory to ensure product availability. Reserved products are exclusively allocated to the specific draft order and cannot be purchased by other customers.

For example, in live-streaming sales, merchants can create draft orders and send bills to customers based on product keywords or customer messages. To guarantee availability, SHOPLINE reserves the products as per the customer's request, such as the desired quantity. This ensures that the requested items are held while the order is finalized.

This guide explains how to reserve inventory by creating a draft order and provides key considerations for using this feature.

Steps to Reserve Inventory for Draft Orders

To create a draft order with inventory reservation, follow these steps: 

1. In your SHOPLINE admin panel, go to Orders > Draft orders. Click Create.
   
2. In the Items section, click Choose items to select products. To add custom products, click Add custom items.
   
3. In the pop-up window, use filters and tags to find and select products. Then, click Select.
   
4. Set the reservation end time. You have two options:

• • For the entire order: Click Reserve items in the upper right of the Items section to set a reservation time for all products.
    
  • For individual products: Click the clock icon next to each product to set specific reservation times.
    

5. In the Customer section, enter customer information:
   

• • Search for or create a customer.
  • Click Edit to enter the shipping and billing addresses.

6. In the Payment section, input the payment information and send the order to the customer.
   

• • Set up the discount, shipping fee, and tax.
  • Choose the payment status and method.
  • Enable Pay later and set a deadline if applicable.

7. Adjust the Market, leave Notes, and add Tags as needed.
   
8. Click Save to create the draft order.
   

Key Considerations for Inventory Reservation 

• SHOPLINE offers two options for reserving inventory: Order-level reservation and item-level reservation.
  • Item without a specified reservation time: The item will follow the reservation time set for the entire draft order.
  • Item with a specified reservation time: If both the item and the draft order have reservation times, the item's reservation time will take precedence.
• Inventory reservation is supported in both draft orders and sales channel scenarios.
• If an order is not placed within the reservation period, the reserved inventory will be released back into stock.