At a glance
Line-level fulfilment status, not order-level. Where Fulfillment Status tells you “this order is Partially Shipped”, this card tells you “150 line items are shipped, 32 are pending, 8 are cancelled”. The line view is essential for catching SKU-specific fulfilment problems that get hidden inside multi-line orders.
| What it counts | GROUP BY consignments.shipping.lineItems.fulfillment_status over the last 30 days. Each line item across all orders is bucketed by its individual fulfilment status. |
| VAT / tax treatment | n/a, count metric. |
| Shipping | n/a (line-item level). |
| Discounts | n/a. |
| Refunds | Refunded line items show explicitly as refunded. |
| Cancelled / voided orders | Cancelled line items (which can occur within a partially-cancelled order) show explicitly. |
| Currency | n/a. |
| Channels / sources | All BC channels contribute. Channel-specific patterns: marketplace orders rarely have partial-line states (the marketplace usually completes the entire order or rejects it). Web orders frequently have line-level partials when items ship from different warehouses or arrive at different times. |
| Why line-level matters | A 12-item order with 2 items unfulfilled looks the same as a 2-item order with 2 items unfulfilled at the order level (both are Partially Shipped). At the line level you can see one is 17% impact and the other is 100%. Line-level status is the right granularity for warehouse capacity planning, SKU-specific inventory issues, and customer-experience triage. |
| BC’s line-level model | BC stores line items inside consignments.shipping.lineItems[]. Each line has its own fulfillment_status independent of the parent order’s status. The vocabulary is similar but not identical to order-level status; pending, shipped, delivered, cancelled, refunded, returned. |
| Multi-warehouse / multi-shipment splits | When a multi-line order ships from two warehouses, BC creates two consignments and tracks each line’s status within its consignment. This card aggregates across consignments. |
| B2B Edition note | B2B orders frequently have line-level partials (a 50-line procurement order with one back-ordered SKU is normal); B2B stores see meaningful share in pending due to the structural reality of supply-chain fulfilment. |
| Time window | 30D (rolling 30 days) |
| Alert trigger | None at this card; pair with Unfulfilled Orders and BC Alert Fulfilment Delay. |
| Roles | owner, operations |
Calculation
Worked example
A US homewares brand on BigCommerce Pro with multi-warehouse fulfilment, last 30 days from 14 Mar 26 to 12 Apr 26.| Line status | Line count | Share | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
shipped | 18,420 | 89.0% | Healthy, terminal positive |
delivered | 1,180 | 5.7% | Terminal, carrier-confirmed |
pending | 580 | 2.8% | Awaiting allocation or shipment |
cancelled | 240 | 1.2% | Customer-initiated or merchant-initiated |
refunded | 180 | 0.9% | Returns processed |
returned | 80 | 0.4% | In return-receive flow |
| Total lines | 20,680 | 100% |
- Line-level pending share is 2.8% vs order-level
Partially Shippedof 1.2% (per Fulfillment Status). The line view exposes more pending units because partial-order states only count once at the order level. The 2.8% is the right operations-team number; the 1.2% is the right customer-comms number. - **580 pending lines = ~540-1,080k of held inventory tying up cash and customer goodwill. Worth investigating which SKUs are pending most.
- Drilling into the pending bucket by SKU typically shows a small number of structurally-late SKUs: items dropshipped from a slow supplier, items with chronic stock-allocation issues, or items where the warehouse routing rule splits orders unnecessarily. Identifying the top 5 pending SKUs lets you fix 60-80% of the pending volume.
- 5.7% delivered share is low if your typical fulfilment lead time is 2-5 days. It suggests delivery confirmation isn’t being captured (carrier integration not configured) rather than slow delivery. Most BC stores see 50-70% of
shippedlines transition todeliveredwithin 7-10 days; if the share is permanently low, the delivery-feedback integration is the gap. - Cancelled at 1.2% is on the high side. Healthy is 0.5-0.9%. A 1.2% cancel rate over 30 days = 240 cancelled lines. Pair with Cancellation Rate to see if it’s customer-initiated or merchant-initiated.
- For
pendingover 3%: drill by SKU. Identify the top 5 chronic-pending SKUs and either (a) hide them from listings, (b) move to dropship-only, (c) raise inventory min-stock thresholds, or (d) renegotiate supplier lead times. - For
cancelledover 1%: split customer-initiated vs merchant-initiated. Customer cancels usually mean the merchant didn’t ship fast enough; merchant cancels usually mean stock allocation failed at pick time. - For low
delivered: configure carrier integration. BC supports tracking webhooks from major carriers; without integration, lines stay inshippedindefinitely. - For rising
refundedorreturned: pair with BC Refunded Products to identify SKUs driving returns. Most return spikes trace to one or two SKUs. - For multi-warehouse stores with high
pending: review your warehouse-routing rules. Aggressive split-shipment rules increase pending share, customers prefer one shipment late over two shipments split.
Sibling cards merchants should reference together
| Card | Why pair it with Line Item Fulfillment Status |
|---|---|
| Fulfillment Status | The order-level view. This card decomposes to lines; that one summarises to orders. |
| Fulfillment Rate Over Time | The trend version. Drops there usually correlate with rising pending share here. |
| Unfulfilled Orders | The actionable subset. pending lines belong to orders that should appear in unfulfilled. |
| BC Top SKUs | The SKU-level revenue view. Top SKUs in pending = top revenue at risk. |
| BC Refunded Products | The SKU-level returns view. Lines in refunded decomposed by product. |
| Cancellation Rate | Order-level cancellation rate. Lines in cancelled provide the unit-level detail. |
| BC Inventory Distribution | Inventory-side view. Pending lines usually map to specific inventory issues. |
| BC Stock vs Sales | Velocity view. Pending lines for high-velocity SKUs are the urgent fix. |
Reconciling against the vendor’s own dashboard
Where to look in BigCommerce Control Panel: BigCommerce does not surface line-level fulfilment status as a single tile natively. The closest views are:- Orders → All orders → click an order → Consignments tab shows per-line fulfilment.
- Orders → All orders with a
Partially Shippedfilter shows orders that have line-level partials, but not the line counts directly.
| Reason | Direction |
|---|---|
| Multi-consignment aggregation. A 4-line order shipped in 2 consignments has 4 line records here; BC’s UI may collapse to 2 consignment rows. Same data, different display. | Same data |
| Split-line semantics. A 5-quantity line item where 3 of 5 ship today and 2 ship later, BC may treat as one line or two. Behaviour varies between BC versions. | Mixed |
| Sync lag. Recent ship events may not be reflected; lag is typically 30-90 minutes. | Vortex IQ slightly LAGS |
| 3PL-managed status. When a 3PL handles fulfilment, the line status is set by the 3PL integration; sync timing matters. | Boundary effects |
| Cancelled vs refunded distinction. Items can be cancelled before shipment or refunded after; we follow BC’s status; merchant teams sometimes use the wrong term. | Definitional |
| Card | Expected relationship | What causes legitimate divergence |
|---|---|---|
shipstation.ss_line_items_pending | ShipStation pending lines should match pending here | ShipStation may include unallocated lines that BC doesn’t yet have a status for. |
shipbob.sb_line_status | ShipBob’s line-level status mirror | ShipBob handles allocation differently; pending may include lines waiting for warehouse pick assignment. |
shopify.line_item_fulfillment(planned)adobe_commerce.line_item_fulfillment(planned)
Known limitations / merchant FAQs
Why is the line-level pending share higher than the order-level partial-shipped share? Because order-level counts a multi-line partial once at the order level; line-level counts each pending line individually. A 12-line order with 2 pending lines is 1 order inPartially Shipped and 2 lines in pending. Both numbers are right; they answer different questions.
My pending share is 5%, when should I worry?
Above 3% is the watch level; above 5% is action. At 5%+ you have meaningful customer-experience risk: each pending line represents a customer waiting beyond their expectation. Drill by SKU; the top 5 chronic-pending SKUs usually account for 60-80% of the volume.
My delivered share is 1%, what’s wrong?
Almost certainly a carrier-integration gap. Without carrier-integration webhooks BC has no way to transition lines from shipped to delivered; they stay in shipped indefinitely. Configure carrier-tracking integration with UPS, FedEx, USPS, DHL, etc. via the BC Apps marketplace.
B2B Edition shows 8% pending, is that normal?
For B2B procurement workflows, yes. B2B orders are larger (50-line, 200-line orders are normal), more complex (multiple warehouses, multiple ship dates), and live longer (30-60 day fulfilment cycles for backordered items are typical). 5-12% pending share is structural for B2B.
Why do my marketplace orders never show line-level partials?
Because marketplaces (Amazon FBA, eBay) typically reject or fully accept orders; partial fulfilment is rare and handled by the marketplace’s own back-office. BC sees the marketplace order as fully shipped or cancelled; the line-level granularity exists upstream.
My theme allows partial cancellations, do they show as cancelled lines?
Yes. A customer who cancels 2 items from a 5-item order leaves the order in Partially Shipped (or Awaiting Shipment if not yet shipped) at the order level, with 2 lines in cancelled and 3 in their actual fulfilment status here. Useful for distinguishing customer-driven cancellation from merchant cancellation.
Should returned and refunded be separate buckets?
Definitionally yes. returned means the customer initiated a return and goods are in transit back; refunded means the refund has been processed. The two states matter for accounting (returned items haven’t yet hit refund-revenue accounting) and for warehouse capacity planning (returned lines need receiving capacity).
My cancelled share is 1.2% but my order-level cancellation rate is 0.9%, why?
Because partial cancellations contribute to the line-level rate but not the order-level rate. A 5-line order with 1 cancelled line contributes 1 cancelled line and 0 cancelled orders. Multi-line orders with partial cancels are the explanation.
Can I see line-level fulfilment in real-time?
Sub-real-time. Line status updates flow through BC webhooks; lag is typically 30-90 minutes from warehouse event to this card. For real-time line-level monitoring use the 3PL’s own dashboard.
Why does my pending share spike on Mondays?
Weekend orders accumulate while warehouses are closed; Monday morning sees the backlog. Normal pattern. The pending share usually peaks Monday afternoon and resolves by Wednesday. If pending share is still rising mid-week, the warehouse is genuinely behind.