Shipping delay message templates for late, lost and sold-out orders

A shipping delay message works best when it arrives before the customer asks. In a 2025 Sendcloud survey of UK shoppers, 85.4% said they expect to hear immediately when an order runs late. Here are ready-to-paste messages for late, lost, sold-out and partly shipped orders.

What does every shipping delay message need to include?

Every shipping delay message needs four things: what changed, a new date or an honest “no date yet”, a free way to cancel, and a person to reply to. Leave one out and the customer writes back to ask for it.

If you sell to US customers, most of that is the law. The US Federal Trade Commission’s guide to the Mail Order Rule says that when you can’t ship on time, your notice must give a revised ship date or say you can’t give one, and must offer cancellation with a full, prompt refund. If you never stated a shipping time, you need a reasonable basis to expect to ship within 30 days.

The guide adds that canceling must cost the customer nothing. Email is a fine way to send the notice. A note on your order-status page only counts if the customer will probably notice it before your promised ship date, so don’t rely on it.

A refund also has to be money. The FTC says a required refund can’t be swapped for store credit or vouchers, and in 2020 it announced a $9.3 million settlement with online retailer Fashion Nova over missed shipping times, missing delay notices and gift cards issued instead of refunds.

Run every template below past this checklist. In the Sendcloud survey, 91% of UK shoppers wanted one easy, direct route to support, and 37% were frustrated by updates arriving from several sources.

• Say what happened in one plain sentence, without blaming the carrier or supplier.
• Give the new date, or say clearly that you don’t have one yet.
• Offer to cancel with a full refund, and say exactly how to ask.
• Tell the customer what happens if they don’t reply.
• Send it by email or the channel they ordered through, and keep later updates there.
• Sign it with a real name and a reply route that reaches a person.

How do you tell a customer their order is delayed?

Tell them the day you find out, in one short message with the new date and a way out. Silence costs more than the delay: in Sendcloud’s 2025 UK survey, 83.2% of shoppers said an unexplained delay frustrates them, and 33.2% said a delay alone would make them leave a store.

Timing matters too. In the same Sendcloud survey, 34.1% said delivery updates reach them too late to change their plans, so don’t wait for the original delivery day.

Delay with a new date

Use this for a first delay when you have a confirmed new ship date. Under the FTC rule, a first notice with a new date 30 days or less away can treat silence as agreement. A first notice with a firm date inside 30 days asks less of the customer than one with no date, because only the dated notice can count silence as a yes.

Template: Hi {name}, your order {order number} won’t ship on {original date} as promised. {One-line reason, for example: our fabric delivery arrived late from the mill.} We now expect to ship it by {new date}. If that still works for you, you don’t need to do anything. If it doesn’t, reply CANCEL and we’ll refund {amount} in full to your original payment method. Sorry for the wait. {Your name}, {store name}

Delay with no date yet

Best for stock stuck with a supplier or in customs, where you honestly can’t predict when it will move. Here silence isn’t a yes. Under the same rule, if you give no date or one more than 30 days out, and the customer neither says yes nor receives the order, it cancels automatically within the original shipping time plus 30 days. So ask them to reply.

Template: Hi {name}, I’m sorry, order {order number} is delayed and I can’t give you a reliable ship date yet. {One-line reason.} Reply KEEP to hold your order and I’ll update you by {date of next update}. Reply CANCEL and we’ll refund {amount} in full. If we don’t hear from you by {deadline}, we’ll cancel and refund the order. {Your name}, {store name}

A second delay on the same order

Use this when you have to push back a date you already gave. The FTC guide says a renewed delay notice can’t treat silence as consent, so this one asks for a clear yes and sets a deadline.

Template: Hi {name}, I need to update you again about order {order number}. It’s now expected to ship by {new date}, later than the {previous date} I gave you. Please reply KEEP if you still want it. If you’d rather cancel, or we don’t hear from you by {deadline}, we’ll refund {amount} in full. Sorry to ask twice. {Your name}, {store name}

What should you say when a parcel is lost or stolen?

Say you’ll fix it, say how and by when, and only then ask the customer for anything. Most victims start with you: in Security.org’s 2026 survey of US adults, 60% of people whose package was recently stolen got in touch with the seller, and 52% went to the delivery company.

Theft is common and growing. In the same Security.org survey, 30% of US adults said a package of theirs had been stolen, up from 24% a year earlier. Getting the reply wrong is expensive: 64.3% of UK shoppers told Sendcloud they wouldn’t order again after a failed delivery.

Check the facts before you reply. Pull up the order, its tracking history and the delivery estimate so your first message is already accurate. And if the same “where is my order” question arrives every day, a Shopify order status chatbot can answer the routine ones while you handle the lost parcels.

The carrier lost the parcel

Use this once tracking has stalled and the carrier confirms the loss. Offer the fix in the first message instead of asking the customer to wait out the carrier’s claim.

Template: Hi {name}, thanks for flagging this. Tracking for order {order number} hasn’t moved since {date}, and the carrier has confirmed the parcel is lost. You shouldn’t have to wait for their investigation, so I can ship a replacement today, arriving around {date}, or refund {amount} in full. Reply with the one you’d prefer. {Your name}, {store name}

Marked delivered but not received

Use this when tracking says delivered and the customer says it isn’t there. Where they live matters: in the Security.org survey, 45% of apartment dwellers reported a stolen package at some point, against 25% of people in single-family homes, so mention mail rooms and neighbors.

Template: Hi {name}, I’m sorry your parcel hasn’t turned up. Tracking shows order {order number} delivered on {date} at {time}. Could you check with neighbors, your building’s mail room or any safe spot a driver might use? If it hasn’t appeared by {date}, reply here and I’ll {send a replacement or refund you} and open the claim with the carrier myself. {Your name}, {store name}

How do you tell a customer an item is out of stock?

Tell them straight away, give them a real choice and never swap in a different product without asking. Customers act on stockouts: in a DOSS survey of 1,000 US adults reported by Retail Insider, 74% had found a regular item out of stock in the past 12 months, and 62% had moved to a competing brand after a stockout.

Sebastiaan Debrouwere, VP of business development and marketing at DOSS, put it plainly to Retail Insider: “In the event of a stockout, the biggest risk is being silent.”

Two rules keep the message honest. If you keep the order open, call it a backorder, an order you accept for an item you don’t have yet, and give a date. And don’t substitute: the FTC guide says you need the customer’s clear, advance agreement before sending noticeably different goods in place of a sold-out item. Offer the alternative and let them choose.

Sold out after the customer ordered

Use this when an item sells out between checkout and packing.

Template: Hi {name}, I’m sorry, the {product} in order {order number} sold out before we could pack it. You can wait for our next batch, expected by {date}, switch to {alternative product} at {price}, or cancel that item for a full refund of {amount}. Nothing changes until you tell me which you’d like. {Your name}, {store name}

Sold out before they buy

Use this when a shopper asks in chat or DMs about a size or color you’ve run out of. It answers the question and keeps the sale possible.

Template: Hi {name}, the {product} in {size or color} is sold out right now. We expect more by {date}. Leave your email here and I’ll message you the day it’s back. If you need it sooner, {alternative product} is in stock and {one honest difference, for example: it runs half a size large}. {Your name}, {store name}

How do you share a restock date without overpromising?

Give a firm date only when the delivery is confirmed, and otherwise say what you know and when you’ll update. Many requested items never come back: across 3,908 stores in Notify Me!’s 2026 back-in-stock benchmark, the median store brought back 67% of the items shoppers had signed up for alerts on, and the top quarter brought back 82%.

A restock alert, a message telling a waiting shopper the item is back, does win some of them back. In the same Notify Me! benchmark, 11.3% of alerted shoppers bought at the median store and 21.1% at the top 10% of stores, while back-in-stock sales brought the median store $831 a year. Treat alerts as good service, not a big revenue line.

Best for products you will actually reorder. If an item is gone for good, say so and point to the closest alternative.

Restock date confirmed

Use this once your supplier has confirmed the delivery.

Template: Hi {name}, an update on the {product}: our next delivery is confirmed for {date}, and it should be back on the site by {date}. You’re on the list, so I’ll message you as soon as it’s live. {Your name}, {store name}

Back in stock

Send this the day the item goes live, to everyone who asked.

Template: Hi {name}, the {product} you asked about is back in stock: {product link}. We only got {quantity} this time, so I wanted you to hear first. {Your name}, {store name}

What do you send when only part of an order ships?

Send one message the day the first box leaves, listing what’s in it, what’s still coming and what you’ve refunded. A partial shipment, sending the items you have now and the rest later or not at all, is where customers lose track fastest.

Get the money right. For US orders, the FTC guide says you owe the customer the gap between their payment and the price of the items you actually sent, and you have to adjust any shipping fee that was based on order size or value.

The rest is coming later

Use this when the missing items are delayed but still on their way.

Template: Hi {name}, part of order {order number} shipped today: {items shipped}. Track it here: {tracking link}. {Items still to come} will ship by {date} at no extra shipping cost. If you’d rather not wait, reply CANCEL and I’ll refund {amount} for those items, plus any shipping difference. {Your name}, {store name}

The rest is canceled

Use this when the missing items won’t ship at all.

Template: Hi {name}, I’m sorry, the rest of order {order number} won’t be coming. {Items canceled} sold out at our supplier. We’ve refunded {amount} to your original payment method, including {shipping amount} of shipping. You’ll see it within {number} business days, depending on your bank. {Your name}, {store name}

How do you offer a fix without sounding scripted?

Rewrite two lines in every template before you send it: the reason and the fix. Those are the lines that show you read this customer’s order, and the rest can stay the same every time.

• Name the product and the order number, not “your items”.
• Give the real reason in plain words, once.
• Apologize once, not in every sentence.
• Match the fix to what they told you, such as a deadline or a gift.
• Only promise what you can deliver today.
• Reply in the channel they used, in a tone close to theirs.

A drafting tool can do the first pass. In LenoChat, the AI Copilot suggests a draft reply based on the conversation, and you edit it before anything reaches the customer. Check the draft against the list above. If the customer then wants to send something back, handle it like any return request chat where you want to keep the customer.

How should you save and adapt these templates?

Save each one as a saved reply with a plain name, such as “Delay, new date” or “Lost by carrier”, so anyone on the team can find it fast. The habits that keep everyday saved replies useful apply here too: clear names, one person responsible and a review whenever your shipping policy, carrier or supplier changes.

Adapt them once before you use them. Swap “reply CANCEL” for however you actually process cancellations, add your real refund timing and match the wording to how your store already talks.

Delay news often lands late on a Friday. Pair these with away messages for nights and weekends so customers who write in hear back before Monday. Start with the dated delay notice and the sold-out message, then add the rest as each situation comes up.