Order lifecycle

Every order on SupaOrder moves through a predictable set of statuses. Understanding the lifecycle helps your team know what to do next at each step — and helps you explain to customers exactly where their order is.

Where to find it

In-flight orders live in Partner app → Orders → Live Orders, grouped into status sections — NEW, PROCESSING, ACCEPTED, READY, and OTHER — each with a count badge. Completed and cancelled orders move to the order history page, and aggregated views are under Dashboard → Reports in your admin dashboard (e.g. https://yourbrand-dashboard.web.app — your exact URL is provided during onboarding).

The happy path

NEW → ACCEPTED → PROCESSING → READY → Out for delivery / Awaiting pickup → Completed

Status	What it means	Who acts — and the button that moves it on
NEW	The customer has paid (or chosen a pay-on-arrival method) and the order is waiting for your restaurant.	Staff — tap Accept (or Reject) promptly
ACCEPTED	Your team has confirmed the order and committed to a preparation time. Receipts and kitchen tickets print at this point.	Kitchen starts; staff tap Start Process
PROCESSING	The order is being cooked/assembled.	Kitchen; staff tap Mark Ready when packed
READY	Food is packed and ready to leave the kitchen.	Staff — hand to driver or customer, then Complete Order
Out for delivery (delivery) / Awaiting pickup (takeaway)	A driver has the order, or it’s on the counter waiting for the customer.	Driver or customer
Completed	The order was delivered or collected. The order moves to history and counts toward reports.	—

Speed matters at “NEW”

Customers watch the app while their order sits in NEW. Accepting quickly (and with a realistic prep time) is the single biggest driver of good ratings. Sound alerts in the partner app repeat until someone responds — see Managing live orders.

The unhappy paths

Two statuses end an order early:

• Cancelled — the order was cancelled by your staff, an admin, or (where you allow it) the customer. Cancelling can trigger an automatic refund and an optional cancellation fee, depending on your settings. See Cancelling orders.
• Failed — the order never became payable or deliverable (for example, an online payment that never completed). Failed orders don’t reach your kitchen and aren’t charged.

Cancelled and failed orders are excluded from sales totals but visible in reports so you can track how often they happen and why.

Notifications at each step

Customers are kept informed automatically — your team doesn’t need to call anyone. Depending on your communication settings, customers receive push notifications (and optionally SMS or email) when the order is:

1. ACCEPTED — with the estimated ready/delivery time
2. PROCESSING — optional, useful for longer prep times
3. READY — pickup customers are told to come collect
4. Out for delivery — with live driver tracking where enabled
5. Completed — often paired with a rating prompt or reward-points credit
6. Edited, cancelled, or refunded — whenever your team changes the order. See Editing orders & refunds

Your staff get notified too: the partner app plays a repeating new-order alert, and drivers are alerted when an order is assigned to them.

Differences by order type

Delivery

• After READY, the order needs a driver. You can assign your own drivers manually with Assign Driver, let auto dispatch offer the order to drivers automatically, or send it to a third-party delivery network.
• The customer sees the driver’s progress and gets an Out for delivery notification when the driver leaves.
• The order completes when the driver marks it delivered.

Takeaway / pickup

• There’s no driver step. After READY, the customer receives a “your order is ready” notification.
• Staff mark the order completed when the customer collects it.
• Pickup orders show the customer’s name and order number so the counter can match customer to bag.

Dine-in (QR table ordering)

• The order carries a table number from the QR code the customer scanned, so staff know where to bring it.
• There’s no pickup or delivery handover — the order completes when it’s served (or when payment is settled, if the customer chose to pay at the table). See Dine-in QR ordering.

Scheduled orders

• Scheduled orders are placed in advance for a chosen time slot. They wait in the partner app’s upcoming view and surface into live orders close to their slot, so the kitchen starts at the right time — not when the order was placed. See Scheduled orders.

Payment along the lifecycle

• Prepaid orders (card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, wallet) are paid at checkout, before the order reaches you. If the payment fails, the order fails — you’ll never see it.
• Pay-on-arrival orders (cash, card on delivery, card terminal) are collected at handover. The partner app shows clearly which orders still need payment.
• If an order is edited after acceptance, the difference may need to be collected or refunded — see Editing orders & refunds.
• If an order is cancelled after payment, the refund flows back automatically or on staff approval, depending on your settings.

For how each method behaves, see the Payments overview.

Where to watch orders

View	What’s in it
Partner app → Orders → Live Orders	Everything in flight, grouped into NEW, PROCESSING, ACCEPTED, READY, and OTHER sections with count badges
Upcoming orders (partner app)	Scheduled orders waiting for their time slot
Order history (partner app & dashboard)	Completed, cancelled, and failed orders
Dashboard → Reports	Aggregated views: sales, refunds, cancellations, per-outlet performance

Next: learn the day-to-day flow in Managing live orders.

Related: Managing live orders · Editing orders & refunds · Cancelling orders · Scheduled orders