Use an order's Due Date to trigger automation rules

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

It’s now possible to configure your Automation Rules to trigger based on an order’s Due Date! This new Due Date trigger type should help you stay on top of your deadlines by automatically taking action when orders are approaching their due dates; are due today; or become overdue. You can use this new trigger type to automatically send reminder emails to yourself, your staff, or custom recipients before an order’s deadline, or to change the order’s stage to something more urgent like “Must Ship Soon” or “Overdue.”

How it works

To get started, you’ll need to create a new automation rule¹ and when prompted for the event that will trigger the rule, select “When an order’s due date is approaching.” You can then configure one or more timing windows which will activate the rule:

Due in 7 days: Triggers the rule 7 days before an order is due, based on your account’s timezone.
Due in 3 days: Triggers 3 days before the order is due.
Due in 1 day: Triggers the day before the order is due.
Due today: Triggers on the day an order is due.
Overdue: Triggers one day after the due date has passed.

Due Date rules operate on batches of orders, grouped by timing

Once per day, Stages checks your open orders and runs the rule’s actions against every order whose Due Date falls within your configured windows. Right now, a Due Date rule can have two types of actions: Send an automated email, and Change the order’s stage. It’s important to understand that, where other Automation Rules operate on one order at a time, rules triggered by a Due Date trigger operate on batches of orders, grouped up by configured timings. This has a couple implications for emails² sent by the rule:

Instead of sending a dozen emails (one for each order), the rule batches them up into a single email.
Because orders are batched up, the emails cannot be sent to your customers (they’d receive a list of all orders that triggered your email).

When you create an email action using a Due Date trigger, the email’s special template variables change to incorporate the batch of orders:

{{batch.orders}}: A list of all orders that matched this Due Date trigger’s timing. Loop over it with {{each batch.orders}} and end the loop with {{end}}.
{{batch.timing}}: A user-friendly string describing the timing (e.g. “Due”, “Due in 1 day”, “Overdue”).
{{batch.timingDays}}: A number representing the offset from today (e.g. 0 for today, 1 for tomorrow, -1 for overdue).
{{batch.dueDate}}: The batch’s due date (e.g. “May 27, 2026”).
{{batch.duedateShort}}: The batch’s due date in short format (e.g. “05/27/2026”).
{{batch.duedateEuro}}: The batch’s due date in European format (e.g. “27/05/2026”).
{{batch.duedateFull}}: The batch’s due date in full format (e.g. “Friday, May 22, 2026”).

Since the batches are grouped by timing (Due in 7 days, Due in 3 days, Due in 1 day, Due today and Overdue), all of the orders in the batch will have the same due date. Here’s an example email that sends a list of orders to the team when those orders become due today or in one day:

Timezone settings

After you’ve configured your new automation rule, you’ll want to adjust your account’s timezone setting for the first time. All accounts use the UTC timezone by default, but a new Account Timezone setting page has been added to the Account Settings page to support the Due Date trigger feature. This setting controls the timezone for when orders cross those timing thresholds – i.e. if your company is in California (-8 UTC) or Singapore (+8 UTC), you probably don’t want an order becoming “Overdue” and firing off those actions at 0 UTC, which would be eight hours ahead or behind when you’d expect it, respectively.

Note: only the account owner can change the account’s timezone settings.

Important notes

On the order dashboard, due dates are displayed in your own local timezone, but the automation rules are triggered in your account’s timezone.
Orders without a due date are never matched by a Due Date trigger.
One automation rule can never trigger another rule, even if it changes an order’s stage.
Email actions only trigger once per day to prevent spam.

If you have any questions or suggestions regarding this feature, please let me know by sending an email to joshua@getstages.com.

Due Date triggers can’t be mixed with other traditional triggers, as they operate on batches of orders rather than one order at a time. ↩
Batching has no notable effect on changing the stages of orders, though, except the usual caveat that changing an order’s stage via Automation Rule will not trigger additional automation rules. ↩

Show due dates on the Stages Tracking widget

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Your customers can now see when their order is due right from the Stages Tracking Widget that’s embedded in your storefront! This new setting – turned off by default – helps set clear expectations for your customer’s delivery, and gives them better visibility into their order’s timeline. This feature works great alongside our new Due Date automation triggers, giving you full control over how due dates are managed and communicated to your customers and your team throughout your fulfillment process.

How to enable it

This feature is turned off by default, as it’s assumed that some users may wish to keep an order’s due date internal to the business. To turn the feature on and allow customers to see the due date, navigate to the app’s Embed Page in your Stages dashboard. Under the “Widget options” section, check the box that’s labeled “Show order due date on the tracking widget”.

Click the Update button to save your changes. Once enabled, any order with a due date will display it on the tracking widget, which can always be found on your storefront at yourstore.com/apps/stages-tracking-widget. You can also use the {{stages.trackingLink}} variable in your Automation Rule emails to link directly to that page.

Color-coded due dates

The due date label automatically adjusts its color to help customers quickly understand the status:

Green: The order is due today
Orange: The order is overdue
Default: The order is due in the future

Privacy considerations

The due date is displayed to anyone who can access an order on the tracking widget. Make sure this aligns with the level of information you want to share with your customers. If you prefer to keep due dates internal, just leave this setting disabled.