How it works

What the customer sees

On the product page, a product with a deposit plan shows two purchase options: pay in full, or pay a deposit today. The deposit option carries one line of copy you control, for example 'Pay 25% today, balance when your order is ready'. The cart and checkout show the deposit as the amount due now and the balance as due later.

After checkout the customer gets a payment schedule by email (and by text on Growth and Pro): what they paid, what is left, when it is due and a link to their payment page. Three days before each payment they get a reminder. After each payment they get a receipt.

What happens at checkout

Balance Due creates a Shopify selling plan for each deposit plan you make. Shopify treats it as a deferred purchase option: the checkout charges the deposit, records payment terms on the order for the balance, and, on Shopify Payments or PayPal, saves the card as a payment mandate against that order.

That is why nothing about tax, discounts, shipping or fraud analysis changes. Shopify works out the deposit and the balance itself and the order shows as partially paid in your admin with the outstanding amount.

Collecting the balance

The due date comes from the plan: a number of days after the order, an exact date, when you mark the order ready, or a set of instalments. Charges run at 9am in your store's time zone.

On the due date Balance Due asks Shopify to charge the mandate for the amount due. Shopify confirms the payment, the order's outstanding amount drops, and the customer gets a receipt. If the charge is declined it is retried after 1, 3 and 7 days; the customer is emailed a pay link each time so they can settle it with a different card. If all attempts fail the order is marked overdue and you are alerted.

Stores whose provider cannot charge a saved card get the pay-link flow instead: on the due date the customer receives Shopify's invoice email and a Balance Due message with the link, then a nudge every 3 days until it is paid.

What you see in Shopify

Every deposit order is tagged deposit:active, then deposit:paid, deposit:overdue or deposit:cancelled, so you can filter your Orders page without opening the app. The order note carries the schedule. Balance Due's own dashboard lists every open plan with its next payment date, and from any order you can mark it ready, collect the balance now, move a payment date, waive an amount, add a note or cancel the plan.

Each morning you get a digest: what is due today, what is due this week, what failed, and which orders were paid in full overnight and are ready to fulfil.

Fulfilment hold

When a deposit order arrives Balance Due places a Shopify fulfilment hold on it with the reason awaiting payment. The hold is released automatically when the balance is paid in full, or by you at any time. Because it is Shopify's own hold, warehouses, 3PL connectors and shipping apps all respect it.

Order edits, refunds and cancellations

Balance Due follows Shopify's outstanding amount rather than its own copy. Edit an order upward and the difference is added to the schedule; refund part of it and the schedule shrinks; mark it as paid in Shopify or take the balance over the phone and the plan closes. Cancel the order and the plan is cancelled with it.

Requirements

• Any Shopify plan with the Online Store channel. Shopify Plus is not required.
• Shopify Payments or PayPal Express for automatic saved-card charges. Other providers use the pay-link flow.
• Payment capture set to automatic at checkout or manual. Per-fulfilment capture is not compatible with deferred purchase options and the app tells you if it finds it.
• A theme that renders Shopify purchase options (every current Shopify theme does).

What Balance Due does not do

It is not a buy-now-pay-later service: there is no credit check and no lender, the customer owes you the balance. It does not take deposits on POS or draft orders, split one order across several people's cards, or offer financing. If you need those, one of the apps on the compare pages will be a better fit.