Why use Prepaid (Separate Orders)?
Prepaid (Separate Orders) is a workaround approach that can only be found exclusively with Appstle, which allows merchants to bypass Shopify's fulfillment limitations.
As is standard across all Shopify Subscriptions apps, all prepaid orders that are sent to Shopify are assigned a fulfillment status; either unfulfilled, fulfilled, or scheduled. This can cause problems for certain third-party apps, which is why we created this brand new plan type.
When selecting Prepaid (Separate Orders) we allow you to bypass Shopify's prepaid plan rules. Instead of future orders being marked as scheduled, future orders will instead be sent to Shopify as a new recurring order with a price of $0, at the time of each fulfillment.
Since this is a workaround approach, we recommend that any merchant that can, make use of our standard Prepaid and Prepaid (Auto-renew) plan types. But if you're having any problems with fulfillments, this is the solution for you!
How to Set Up Prepaid (Separate Orders)
Create a New Product
In order to make use of a Prepaid (Separate Orders) plan you'll need to create a new product in Shopify for each product that you plan on offering with this subscription model.
In this step it's crucial that you match the value of your product exactly with the number of fulfillments you're setting up.
The value of your product should be exactly the value set in Billing Frequency divided by the value set in Order fulfillment frequency multiplied by the base value of the original product.
For example in the configuration below, the customer will pay upfront for 3 orders. This means that the price of your new product should be 3 times the price of your original product.
If you already have a product in your store that you'd like to offer with a Prepaid (Separate Orders) plan - you can edit the product in Shopify and click Duplicate, to save you the hassle of recreating the product from scratch.
Once you've created the new product and ensured that the price is exactly the value set in Billing Frequency divided by the value set in Order fulfillment frequency multiplied by the base value of the original product - you're ready to configure your plan.
Creating Your Subscription Plan
Simply head over to Subscription Plans in Appstle Subscriptions and click Create Subscription Plan.
Add the product that you've chosen to offer with a Prepaid (Separate Orders) plan. If you want to add multiple products that will all be offered with the same frequency feel free to do so!
Now all that's left to do is Edit the Subscription Frequency and select Prepaid (Separate Orders) as your Billing type, found in the General section.
Remember to double check that your product price reflects exactly the configuration you've set up above.
If you'd like to customize any other aspects of your subscription, feel free to do so from within the Edit selling plan section - which is where you just edited the billing type.
Creating New Shipping Rules
Since each new "fulfillment" will be handled as a new recurring order by Shopify, you will need to manually account for shipping fees if you'd like to charge your customer up front for all shipping costs associated with each order.
Otherwise the standard shipping fees will apply for each new order and follow the rules set up either in your Shopify Admin, or Appstle Shipping Profile.
If you want to charge your customer upfront for all shipping costs associated with each order, you'll need to create a New Profile specifically for this product in your Shopify Shipping and Delivery Settings.
Once you've created the new shipping profile, add the product that you're offering with a Prepaid (Separate Orders) plan, and add the associated cost of shipping.
Ensure that the shipping cost is multiplied by the value set in Billing Frequency divided by the value set in Order fulfillment frequency multiplied by the base value of the original product.