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FAQ & Troubleshooting

Answers to the most common questions and issues.

General​

Do I have to edit each product?​

No. Everything is campaign-driven. You create a Preorder or Back in Stock campaign, target the products (all, specific, or — in Pro — categories and tags), and the plugin applies the behaviour automatically.

Does it work with variable products?​

Yes. Preorder and Back in Stock campaigns work with simple and variable products, including per-variation waitlist sign-ups. WooCommerce's native backorder setting is separate; see Preorders.

Is it compatible with HPOS and the Cart & Checkout Blocks?​

Yes. The plugin declares compatibility with WooCommerce High-Performance Order Storage (HPOS) and works with both the classic shortcode cart/checkout and the Cart & Checkout Blocks (Store API).

Which product types are not supported?​

Subscriptions, bundles, composites and bookings are intentionally excluded. These have their own purchase flows that conflict with preorder behaviour.

Preorder​

The preorder button or message doesn't show on the product page​

Check that:

  • The product is out of stock (or your campaign's Availability is set to always).
  • An active Preorder campaign targets the product and its schedule is current — an expired schedule is the most common cause.
  • The product type is eligible — see above.
  • Your theme uses standard WooCommerce hooks. Some page builders replace the product template; test on a standard theme such as Storefront to confirm.

If your theme is the problem, use the Preorder Message block or the asnp_wepo_display_hook filter to render the output on a hook your theme does fire.

My preorder button colours don't change​

Set them in the campaign's Colors tab. They apply to the Add to Cart button on the single product page and are printed as scoped CSS with !important. A heavily customised product template can still win — test on Storefront to confirm whether it is the theme.

Can I preorder a product that is in stock?​

Yes. Set Availability to always (or only in stock) in the campaign's Content tab.

Back in Stock​

When are customers notified?​

Automatically, when a product with pending sign-ups becomes purchasable again through WooCommerce — a manual stock edit, the WooCommerce REST API, or an order refund/cancel restock. Notifications are queued and sent in the background through Action Scheduler.

I restocked but no emails went out​

Work through these in order:

  1. Did you change stock outside WooCommerce? Raw SQL and some importers bypass the stock hooks entirely. Use the Send back-in-stock alerts action on the Products list (Waitlist).
  2. Is the Back in Stock email enabled under WooCommerce → Settings → Emails?
  3. Can your store send email at all? See the Emails section below — this is the most common answer.
  4. Are there still pending sign-ups for that product, or were they all notified earlier?
  5. Check WooCommerce → Status → Scheduled Actions for the queued job, and Status → Logs for failures.

Notifications run as background jobs, so allow a short delay before concluding nothing happened.

If the restock job appears in WooCommerce → Status → Scheduled Actions, the plugin detected the stock change. Check its status and the WooCommerce logs if delivery still fails.

The Notify me button doesn't appear​

  • Confirm an active Back in Stock campaign targets the product.
  • Confirm the product is actually out of stock.
  • If a Preorder campaign also matches, check the Coexist with preorder setting — you may have told it to show the preorder button only.
  • On a block theme or page builder, use the Notify Me block or the [asnp_wepo_notify_form] shortcode.

Will customers be emailed twice?​

No. Sending is idempotent and locked per product — each person is notified once per restock. A processing lock plus a per-row notified status prevents concurrent batches from double-sending.

Emails​

Emails aren't being delivered​

On many hosts, and on almost all local and staging sites, the default PHP mailer does not deliver reliably. Install an SMTP plugin, or use a mail-catcher such as Mailpit locally. Use the Preview button in WooCommerce → Settings → Emails to check the layout without sending.

This is by far the most common "the plugin isn't working" report, and it is almost never the plugin.

Where can I see if a send failed?​

Send failures are logged under WooCommerce → Status → Logs, source restockbeacon-preorder-back-in-stock-for-woocommerce.

Pick the plugin's source from the dropdown in WooCommerce → Status → Logs to see send failures.

Can I change the email design?​

Yes. The Back in Stock email has a full designer — branded or WooCommerce template, four layouts, sender, subject, colours, logo, social links and product image. For deeper changes, copy the template into your theme at yourtheme/woocommerce/emails/. See Emails.

Can I use the product name in the subject?​

Yes, with the {product_name} token.

Data & privacy​

What happens to sign-up data when I uninstall?​

Nothing is deleted unless you turn on Delete all data on uninstall in Settings. See Settings.

Is it GDPR friendly?​

Yes — sign-ups require explicit consent, every email has a one-click unsubscribe, and the plugin integrates with WordPress's personal-data export and erase tools. See the Privacy section in Settings.

Why does it store an IP address?​

Only for per-IP rate limiting to block automated sign-up spam. It is not used for identification.

Theme & compatibility​

It works on Storefront but not on my theme​

Some themes and page builders replace the WooCommerce product template and never fire the standard hooks. Three options, in order of preference:

  1. Use the Notify Me and Preorder Message Gutenberg blocks to place the output exactly where you want it.
  2. Use the [asnp_wepo_notify_form] shortcode.
  3. Point the output at a hook your theme does fire, with the asnp_wepo_display_hook filter.

Does it work with caching plugins?​

Yes, with one caveat: the sign-up form carries a nonce, and a very long full-page cache lifetime can serve a stale one to logged-out visitors, producing a "session expired" message on submit. If you see that, exclude the product template from full-page caching or shorten its lifetime.

Still stuck?​

Check WooCommerce → Status → Logs (source restockbeacon-preorder-back-in-stock-for-woocommerce) and WooCommerce → Status → Scheduled Actions to see what the plugin is doing in the background, then contact support with those details.