Store and payment problems

Store problems usually come down to an unfinished Stripe connection or the store being in a different mode than you think. Start with the status indicators on Store → Settings before digging deeper.

Stripe onboarding is stuck or incomplete

On the Commerce page, the Payment Processor button tells you the state of your connection:

• Validation Required with a Pending badge means you submitted details to Stripe but charges aren't enabled yet. Click the button to go back to Stripe; there's usually an outstanding requirement, most often identity verification or bank details.
• Afterify re-checks the account automatically for a minute or two after the settings page opens. If you just finished onboarding and the button hasn't changed, reload the page.
• If you abandoned onboarding halfway, click the button again to resume; your progress on Stripe's side is kept.

You can't switch the store to Live until this completes: "A payment processor must be connected before you can activate your store." Also make sure a mailing address is saved in your account settings; without one the store deactivates itself and shows "You must add a mailing address in your account settings to activate your store."

If Stripe rejects your business details or the account stays restricted, the specifics are shown in your Stripe dashboard at stripe.com; fix them there. If it still won't clear, contact support.

Test mode vs live orders

The Store Status switch (Inactive / Test / Live) changes what your orders list shows:

• In Test mode, checkout skips payment entirely and the orders list shows your test orders.
• In Live mode, the orders list shows real orders; test orders no longer appear.

So "my orders disappeared" after going live almost always means you're looking for test orders in live mode: they're not gone, just filtered by mode. Likewise, a client reporting they "paid nothing" means the store was in test mode when they checked out; no payment was processed and no print order was placed. Switch to Live and have them order again.

An order seems to be missing

1. Confirm the store mode matches the order you're looking for (see above).
2. Check the sort and pagination on Store → Orders; newly sorted columns can push recent orders off the first page.
3. Ask what the buyer saw. If they never reached the Order Complete page, the payment didn't finish; an abandoned Stripe checkout creates no order. A Payment failed status means their card was declined after checkout began.
4. Confirm the buyer purchased from your gallery. Clients occasionally check out from a different photographer's gallery link.

Orders appear within moments of a completed payment, and each one has a sequential six-digit number, so a gap in your numbering is worth a closer look. If you have a Stripe payment with no matching Afterify order, contact support with the order details.

Tax or shipping totals look wrong

• Tax charged (or not charged) unexpectedly: tax is applied only for states where you've added a rate under Store → Settings → Taxes, based on the buyer's location. An Inclusive rate is contained in your listed price, while an Exclusive rate is added on top; mixing that up is the most common source of "the total looks wrong". See Set up taxes.
• Shipping higher than the table shows: WHCC's listed prices are starting rates, and additional shipping rates may apply to larger items that ship separately. See Set up shipping.
• Your payout is less than the sale price: open the order and hover Cost & Fees for the breakdown: the lab's product cost, Stripe's transaction fee (2.9% + $0.30), tax and shipping pass-throughs, and the 15% commission on Free plan stores. What remains is shown as Your Profit. See Orders and invoices.

Related

• Connect Stripe
• Test and publish your store
• Orders and invoices