Customer doesn't have an active account

Occasionally you may encounter customers who have issues logging into their Shopify customer accounts, which they created while joining a product's waiting list on your Shopify store.

This is a bit of a complicated subject, so please email us at help@wait.li if you have any questions at all. I do advise you to read this article, first, though; as it will help cover the basics!

The TLDR version is:
Most likely this customer's account is 'not active' in Shopify's terms. In order for this customer to login to their account properly, they need to create a new password for their account via an account invite email sent by you, or sent by Wait.li. Once they create a new password, they can sign in to their account and go ahead with purchasing a product, viewing past orders, etc. Wait.li automatically sends this 'account invite' email when a customer is activated from a waiting list; but sometimes customers ignore this email. You can manually send this invite by clicking "Send account invite" on the customer's page in the Shopify Admin.

Shopify Customer Account States

Wait.li uses Shopify's customer account system for managing customer registration, and logins. This is helpful, as we can rely on Shopify's system for security, password management, order tracking, etc.

Shopify's customer account system has 3 states which a customer can be placed in:

• Active
• Disabled
• Not active / invite sent

Active / Disabled

These two states are straight forward.

An ' active' customer has a fully functioning account which they can log into, make purchases, etc. This customer would be able to join a waiting list with their account.
An active customer account will look like this on their customer page in Shopify, note the "Has an account" under their

A 'disabled' customer has had their account disabled (manually, by you or someone on your team from within the Shopify Admin). This customer can't log in or interact with their customer account. They would not be able to join a waiting list with this account's email.

Not active / invite sent

A ' not active' or 'invite sent' customer is in a bit of a limbo in Shopify's account system. This is what a 'not active' account in Shopify looks like:

In the top right corner, you can see 'Send account invite' button - this identifies that the customer is 'not active'. You can also see under their email it displays 'No account'.

What this means is that the customer had a customer account before registering for the waiting list, but their account did not have a password associated with it. 

They may have created this account via another app, an email sign up form, or buying a product without creating a password for their account (simply adding their email). Shopify labels this customer as a ' not active' account. Basically, they have half an account - they have an email associated with an account, but not a password;

A 'not active' account can't sign in, as Shopify doesn't think they are a full account yet. Even though Wait.li adds their password on joining a waiting list; Shopify still thinks they are 'not active'; so it doesn't allow the password to work. 

Highlight: Shopify does not allow Wait.li (or any other app) to activate / enable a customer's account for them. Shopify requires that each customer activates their account by themselves.

How To Resolve The Issue

The solution to this is relatively simple, but adds an extra step for this customer.

Shopify allows you to send an 'account invite' to these customers; which is an email that asks them to create a password. This password creation effectively 'activates' their account; and after this step, they are able to then login and go through the waiting list process as normal.

Wait.li automatically sends this 'account invite' email to a customer in this scenario when they are activated from a waiting list; but sometimes people ignore the email.

What I would suggest for this circumstance, is to either contact the customer, and ask them to check their email for an 'account invite' email - or - click the "Resend account invite" button (seen in screenshot above). This will send a new account invite email to the customer, which will allow them to create a new password.

To confirm: once a customer creates their new password via the 'account invite' email, their account will be set to 'active' in Shopify, meaning they can then log in to their account; purchase their waiting list product, and do all the other various Shopify customer account features.

I am actively in contact with Shopify to figure out a better solution for this. This is a Shopify platform issue, unfortunately, and there isn't a way for me to solve this within Wait.li.

Let me know if that all makes sense :)