Thoughts on managing backorders

[AbleMods]

Before I drop a post in the feature request forum, I thought I'd open the topic for discussion here first.

I am quickly finding the need for better management of backorders. Everything I sell is drop-shipped, so I at least need the following:

1. Ability to mark an order as "ordered but backordered". I added a new order status, but it's not very obvious in the orders summary screen. Perhaps a color-coding of the text would help here?

2. Email-Notify customer that product purchased is on backorder and an expected shipdate (if possible) upon checkout. For some bizarre reason, the message on the product screen "There are 0 of this item available." and a "BACKORDERED" message in bold in the first line of the product description don't seem to always do the trick. <shrug>

3. Receive an alert on each admin login of backorders still outstanding or perhaps a separate window in the dashboard just for backorders. Would make a fantastic "to do" list.

4. Customer alerts: customer subscribes to an out-of-stock product and receives an email alert when that item has become available for shipment again.

I am going to write a sync routine with my distributor to notify me of order status changes. That should automate my "backorder has shipped" scenario. But that isn't going to help everyone else I know.

Thoughts?

[compunerdy]

I like to retain as much sanity as possbile so I say NO to backorders

I would like to see your number 4 idea implemented though.

[hassonmike]

Did anything ever come of this? I know this is a few years old, but I still don't see much for backorder management in AC 7.0.3

[AbleMods]

Backorder management hasn't really improved much since 7.0.3. There are many, many other improvements though...7.0.3 is pretty old these days.

[AnySupport]

I know I've found this post even later.. but any chance anything came of this by now/ in Gold?
We're looking to implement very similar functionality and from what I've been able to investigate, it doesn't seem to be in the standard product.. but I don't know how to fully test some of these more time/date related scenarios within my sandbox install.

Just trying to make sure I'm not overlooking some basic management of this before we start requesting custom development for it.

Thank you!

[Katie]

In Gold, you can use the Availability date feature to show customers when the product will be back in stock. The trouble with adding an email field is that we have to consider this could be used in a malicious manner. So, if we are to add the feature, we would need to have some options for using Captcha, and a new email template or two. You are more than welcome to request it though! The green Feedback button is the best way to request a new feature. If you get some votes, then you can expect to see it in a future release.

Thanks!