Knowledgebase: Modules

What is the Reserve Inventory App?

 

Shift4Shop's Reserve Inventory app allows for merchants to protect their customers' carts in the event they need to sell time sensitive goods such as tickets to an event that may sell out quickly. This is a separate paid app that can be purchased on our App Store here.

Normally, on Shift4Shop, stock is only updated after an order is completed. For example, let's say you have three customers and a product with two stock available. The situation will play out like so:

  1. Customer 1 adds the product to the cart, and checks out. The stock is updated to 1 in the Store Manager automatically.
  2. Customer 2 adds the product to the cart, but decides to not check out immediately and continues to browse.
  3. Customer 3 is able to add the product to the cart, and checkout. The stock updates to 0.

Customer 2 will either send the stock to -1 or the product will be removed from the cart depending on Inventory Control settings at this time. This can lead to conflicts with customers trying to buy high interest items.

The Reserve Inventory App, however, changes this. Instead of updating the stock for a product upon checkout, it will update when it is added to the cart. This helps to prevent any potential overselling issues, and prevents customer frustration.

With the Reserve Inventory App, a situation with three customers and a product with two stock available will play out like so:

  1. Customer 1 adds product to the cart and checks out. Stock is updated to 1 as expected.
  2. Customer 2 adds the product to the cart, but continues to browse.
  3. Customer 3 is now unable to add this product to the cart.

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