Abandoned Cart

AutomateWoo can track carts for registered customers and guests, mark inactive carts as abandoned, and start workflows that remind customers to return. This guide explains how cart status changes, where to review stored carts, and how to capture enough guest data to send a cart-recovery message.

Configure cart tracking

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1. Go to AutomateWoo > Settings > Carts.
2. Enable Enable cart tracking.
3. Set the Abandoned cart timeout. This is the number of minutes since the cart’s last activity before AutomateWoo can mark it abandoned. The default is 15 minutes, and the minimum is 5 minutes.
4. Decide whether failed, cancelled, and pending orders should remain eligible for abandoned-cart workflows. When this option is off, carts converted to those order statuses are excluded.
5. Set Clear inactive carts after. AutomateWoo deletes stored cart records after this many days without an update. The default is 60 days.

How cart abandonment works

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A current stored cart starts as Active. Cart activity includes changing its contents and loading the cart or checkout page. When the cart has been inactive for the configured timeout, AutomateWoo’s background cart job marks it Abandoned. The job runs about every two minutes, so the status may change shortly after the exact timeout.

The status change causes workflows using the Cart Abandoned trigger to evaluate the cart. Use the registered-user-only or guest-only versions of the trigger when the workflow should target only one customer type.

If the customer returns and the cart becomes active before a delayed workflow action runs, AutomateWoo removes that cart’s queued events. The abandonment timer then starts again from the cart’s latest activity. Each workflow can run only once for the same stored cart, so a workflow that has already completed will not run a second time for that cart.

When the customer empties the cart or an order causes the cart to stop being tracked, the stored record moves to a terminal status:

• Emptied: the customer removed all items.
• Placed: the customer placed an order before the cart was marked abandoned.
• Recovered: the customer placed an order after the cart had been abandoned.

These terminal records are kept for reporting and are removed after the configured inactive-cart period. Later cart activity creates a new current cart, which can qualify for the workflows again.

Review stored carts

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Go to AutomateWoo > Carts to see active, abandoned, emptied, placed, and recovered carts. The table shows the customer, last activity, item quantity, total, and current status. Use the customer and status filters to narrow the list.

Select View in the Actions column to inspect the products, quantities, totals, cart token, and creation date stored with the cart.

Capture guest data

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AutomateWoo can associate a cart with a registered customer through their account. For a guest, it needs an email address before checkout is submitted. Pre-submit data capture can save the guest’s email and available billing fields while they enter checkout information. For security, AutomateWoo does not capture an email address that belongs to an existing user account before an order is placed.

Pre-submit capture uses session-tracking cookies and is disabled by default. Before enabling it, decide whether your store must obtain consent for these cookies or for collecting unfinished form data. AutomateWoo can wait for a named consent cookie, but it does not display a cookie banner; use a consent solution or custom integration for that notice.

1. Go to AutomateWoo > Settings > General.
2. Under Session tracking, enable Enable session tracking.
3. If required, enable Require cookie consent and enter the exact, case-sensitive cookie name used by your consent solution.
4. Enable Enable pre-submit data capture.
5. Choose where AutomateWoo loads the capture script:

• Checkout Only captures supported fields on the checkout page.
• All Pages also lets you capture an email from supported custom fields elsewhere on the site.

Current AutomateWoo versions support guest capture on both the classic checkout and Checkout block. The plugin stores the email and any supported billing fields available when the checkout data is saved. Custom checkout fields are not included unless they use a supported selector or are added through a developer customization.

Review captured guests

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Go to AutomateWoo > Guests to review guest records. This screen includes guests captured before checkout and guests who placed an order without creating an account. Select View to inspect the available profile and activity data.

Capture email from another form

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To capture an email field outside checkout, set Where should pre-submit data capture be enabled? to All Pages. Your developer can configure which fields AutomateWoo recognizes and test the form in a new guest browser session.

See the developer guides to add custom guest email selectors and disable comment-form email capture.

Test abandoned-cart tracking

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1. Open a new private or incognito browser window. Do not sign in; AutomateWoo can remember a registered user through its session-tracking cookie even after logout.
2. If your configuration requires cookie consent, give that consent before testing.
3. Add a product to the cart, open checkout, and enter a test email address that is not associated with a user account.
4. Confirm the address under AutomateWoo > Guests and the cart under AutomateWoo > Carts.
5. Leave the cart untouched for the configured timeout, plus enough time for the background job to run. Confirm its status changes to Abandoned.
6. If testing a workflow, review AutomateWoo > Queue and AutomateWoo > Logs. Keep promotional recovery messages non-transactional and review your marketing opt-in and unsubscribe settings before activating the workflow.