“Your banner says free shipping but I’m being charged $8.”
Free shipping is a rate with a minimum, and the minimum counts the cart after its discounts and before tax. Under it, the customer pays the rate.
Get notified: Coming soon$50.10 short of free shipping. Free shipping needs $70.00 after discounts; this cart is $19.90, so it's $50.10 short.
Why it happens
In Shopify, free shipping is usually a shipping rate of $0.00 with a condition: the order price is at least a minimum. Shopify compares that minimum with the cart’s subtotal after discounts and before tax. A cart that reaches the minimum before a code can drop under it once the code is taken off, and lose free shipping with it.
This cart is two tins of wax, $19.90, to New York. The free rate starts at $70.00, so the customer pays Standard shipping, $8.00. The price X-ray is drawn to the minimum, so the gap is what you see.
What Checkout X-Ray reads
- The shipping zone that serves the cart’s country, in each profile that ships its products, and its $0.00 rates with an order-price condition. On stores that set shipping per market, the market’s shipping options.
- The cart’s subtotal after discounts and before tax, in the currency the condition is set in.
- When there are several free rates, the one the cart qualifies for, else the one it’s closest to.
The sentence then names the place: the free rate and its shipping zone, or the shipping option and its market.
What to look at in Shopify
The condition on the free rate, in Settings → Shipping and delivery, in the zone for the customer’s country. Or the shipping option in Settings → Markets, if shipping is set per market.
After you install, Home suggests a test cart just under your free-shipping minimum, so you can see this cart in your own store.
The sentence Checkout X-Ray writes for this reason, filled in for each cart: Free shipping needs minimum after discounts; this cart is amount, so it’s gap short.
Answer the next one with an X-ray.
Install on Shopify
Add Checkout X-Ray from the Shopify App Store. It opens in your Shopify admin, on the Free plan.
Build the customer’s cart
Open the Simulator. Pick the products, type the code they used and the country it ships to, then calculate the price.
Read the answer
The price X-ray shows each layer, and every code that wasn't applied gets a sentence saying why. Save it as a test cart to have it checked again.
