Every order, whatever channel it came from, carries three separate statuses: an Order Status, a Payment status and a Fulfillment status. They change independently, so an order can be Paid and Unfulfilled at the same time. Knowing which one moves when is the key to working orders and to building flows that react to them.
📸 Screenshot placeholder: The top of an order’s detail page (use a test order): the order number, the status badge and the Order Status, Payment and Fulfillment dropdowns.
Order Status
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Pending | The order is in but not confirmed yet |
| Confirmed | Accepted and ready to work. Storefront orders arrive as Confirmed once checkout completes |
| Processing | In progress. Orders in Processing count toward Needs Attention on the Orders page |
| Shipped | Marked as shipped |
| Completed | Finished. Set automatically when an order is paid, fully shipped and every shipment has been marked delivered |
| On Hold | Parked on purpose, for example while you check an address or a payment |
| Cancelled | Cancelled before it shipped |
| Refunded | Refunded in full |
Orders that sync in from a marketplace start with the status that marketplace reports.
Payment
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Pending | Not paid yet, for example a phone order you entered as unpaid |
| Paid | Payment received |
| Partially refunded | Part of the payment has been refunded |
| Refunded | The full payment has been refunded |
| Failed | The payment did not go through |
Fulfillment
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Unfulfilled | Nothing has shipped yet |
| Backordered | Paid, but an item is out of stock and the order is waiting for a restock or a special-order PO |
| Awaiting Vendor | A drop-ship purchase order has gone to the vendor, who ships it |
| Partial | Some items have shipped |
| Fulfilled | Every item has shipped |
| Returned | The order came back to you |
| Cancelled | Set when an order is fully refunded, or by hand |
What moves each status
- Order Status: a storefront order starts as Confirmed. You can change it by hand (see below). Cancel Order sets Cancelled, and a full refund sets Refunded. Completed is set automatically as described above.
- Payment: set when the customer pays at checkout, or by the payment method you choose on a manual order. Issue Refund moves it to Partially refunded or Refunded.
- Fulfillment: shipments drive it. Each shipment recorded against the order recalculates the status: Partial after some items ship, Fulfilled after all of them. ILLUMA sets Backordered and Awaiting Vendor itself when an item is out of stock or a drop-ship PO goes out.
ℹ️ Note: A shipment that arrives from ShipStation counts every line on the order as shipped. To record a partial shipment, use Create Shipment on the order page and choose the items and quantities. See Fulfillment overview.
Flows can react to these changes, for example when an order is paid or cancelled. No flow action changes an order’s status.
Change a status by hand
- Open the order from the Orders page.
- Pick the new value in the Order Status, Payment or Fulfillment dropdown at the top.
- Click Save Changes at the top right.
⚠️ Warning: Setting Order Status to Cancelled in the dropdown only changes the label. It does not refund the customer or tell a marketplace. To cancel an order properly, use Cancel Order. See Returns & refunds.
Delivery and tracking
ℹ️ Note: ILLUMA does not pull delivery updates from carriers. A shipment gets a carrier and a tracking number, but it only shows In Transit or Delivered when someone sets it. On a shipment’s page, Mark as Delivered sets it to Delivered. To check where a package is, select shipments on the Shipments page and use Track, which opens the carrier’s tracking page.
Needs Attention
The Needs Attention number at the top of the Orders page counts open orders that need you: paid orders that are Unfulfilled or Backordered, and orders in Processing. Orders that are Awaiting Vendor, Cancelled or Refunded are not counted. It is a count, not a separate queue, so work through the Unfulfilled and Backordered tabs to clear it.
Emails your customers get
For orders placed on your storefront, ILLUMA sends these customer emails by default: order confirmation, shipping confirmation, shipping update, delivery confirmation (when a shipment is marked delivered), order cancelled, refund confirmation and ready for pickup. You can review or change them under Notifications. Marketplace buyers are never emailed by ILLUMA, because the marketplace handles those messages.
How this maps to automation
Because the statuses are the same on every channel, a trigger like Order paid fires the same way whether the sale came from your storefront, Amazon or eBay, so one flow can cover all your orders. See Triggers & actions.