Operations
Ecommerce platform operations in England: 30-day, 14-day and six-month clocks, plus BigCommerce plan caps in dollars
Five operating stages for an England merchant's ecommerce platform: 30-day delivery, 14-day refund and six-month log clocks, plus BigCommerce caps in US dollars.
An England merchant needs one traceable operating record from catalogue approval to archive. A dashboard label such as paid, fulfilled or closed is not enough. The team must know which real event happened, who authorised it and which clock is running.
What to take away
- Delivery within 30 days, unless agreed otherwise, is a clock the order record must show.
- A refund has a 14-day clock, and it must go back by the original means of payment.
- Keep the most important logs for at least six months, and protect them from tampering.
- Name two people for risky actions such as price changes and refunds above a set value.
- A product withdrawal must block sale, identify affected orders and preserve evidence.
Define states and clocks in the merchant's language
Start with a state dictionary. For each term, record the event that opens it, the evidence required, the permitted actor, the next states and the time source. Do not accept a supplier label until it maps to your contract and your accounting record.
| Record | Minimum states | Clock to track |
|---|---|---|
| Catalogue item | drafted, evidence checked, approved, published, suspended, withdrawn, archived | Evidence expiry date |
| Customer order | submitted, accepted, dispatched, delivered, cancelled, returned | Delivery within 30 days |
| Refund | requested, authorised, paid, reconciled | 14 days from return or notice |
| Support case | received, classified, assigned, answered, closed | Your own service target |
| Audit log | captured, stored, reviewed | At least six months for key logs |
Stage 1: approve catalogue evidence
Every item begins off sale. The record should identify the supplier, variant, description source, price owner, tax input, stock source, delivery restrictions, safety evidence, warnings and images. Publish only the approved version.
The Product Safety Database is the notification system for unsafe products, and OPSS is the UK's national product regulator. In its 2025 to 2026 report, the most frequent corrective action was import rejected at border, with 1,102 actions, or 28 per cent. Destruction of the product followed with 611 actions, and listing removal by an online marketplace with 594.
When evidence expires or a safety signal arrives, suspend the listing while the owner investigates. A correction keeps a version trail.
Stage 2: present the customer journey
Test the journey before launch with the market entry checklist. The GOV.UK distance selling guidance lists what must be given before an order is placed, including delivery arrangements and costs and how long goods will take to arrive.
A customer can cancel up to 14 days after the order is delivered, and if you fail to tell them, the right runs for longer. Record the cancellation notice shown, the exact time and the version of the terms. Check the payment gateways you plan to use at the same time.
Stage 3: accept orders and deliver
Order submission is not acceptance, and payment authorisation is not settlement. Define when the contract is formed, then make stock reservation and payment capture follow that decision.
After the order, a copy of the contract must reach the customer no later than delivery, and goods must be delivered within 30 days unless agreed otherwise. Put a 30-day alert on every accepted order. A dispatch label is not the end of the clock: the delivered state is.
For each payment attempt, keep order identifier, basket version, price and tax version, provider event, timestamp and operator action. Reconcile captures to settlements with the order to settlement record.
Stage 4: returns and refunds
The Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013 govern the refund. Under regulation 34, reimbursement must be without undue delay, and for a sales contract where the trader has not offered to collect, within 14 days of receiving the goods back.
The refund must use the same means of payment as the original transaction unless the consumer agreed otherwise, and no fee may be charged for it. Track receipt, inspection, refund decision, payment-provider event and customer confirmation. The refund stays open until the money event and the ledger match.
Example: one return, five records
Hypothetical example: a customer returns a lamp on day 3 after delivery. Receipt is logged on day 6. The 14-day refund clock ends on day 20. The refund event is logged on day 9 and reconciled on day 11. Five records cover it: order, return, inspection, provider event and ledger.
Stage 5: access, logs and incidents
Staff can change prices and issue refunds, so control them. An access policy should cover who may do what, how audit records are safeguarded against tampering, and which actions need two people to authorise them.
Remove access promptly when staff move or leave, and use multi-factor authentication on online service accounts.
Logging should be proportionate, and the main priority is the ability to respond to incidents, for which logs are required. Keep the most important logs for at least six months (NCSC logging and monitoring guidance). For incidents, keep a careful record of the response, decisions, actions and data captured, which helps the post-exercise review.
Plan caps and supplier questions
Plan limits change how a store is run. BigCommerce publishes prices in US dollars only, with no sterling figure on the page, billed annually: Core at $29 a month, Growth at $79, Scale at $299, and Performance from $1,499. Core and Growth carry trailing 12-month sales limits, then auto-upgrade.
| BigCommerce plan | Published price a month, billed annually | Published sales limit |
|---|---|---|
| Core | $29 | Up to $30K TTM GMV, then auto-upgrade to Growth |
| Growth | $79 | Up to $100K TTM GMV, then auto-upgrade to Scale |
| Scale | $299 | $33,333 a month GMV, with 0.9% on GMV above the cap |
| Performance | From $1,499 | Custom pricing |
An auto-upgrade is an operational event: it changes cost and may change staff or support terms. Log the plan, the cap and the review date next to the order records.
A supplier's dashboard labels do not replace your own records. Put the same questions to each candidate, whether it is Shopify, WooCommerce with a host, BigCommerce or another route, and keep the answers in the vendor file. Answers are supplier claims until you test them.
| Stage | Question for the supplier | Evidence to request |
|---|---|---|
| Catalogue | Can a product be saved off sale until approved, with a version trail? | A recorded demo on a test product |
| Order | Can the order record show an accepted date and a delivered date? | An export sample with both fields |
| Refund | Can a refund be issued by the original payment method and logged with a provider event? | A test refund and its settlement record |
| Access | Can staff roles be limited, and are changes logged? | The role list and a log extract |
| Exit | Can catalogue, orders and audit history be exported in full? | A restore test on synthetic data |
Exit as a normal state
Run catalogue and order exports on a schedule, not only after a termination notice. Validate identifiers, media links, payment references and audit history. A successful download does not prove a complete restore.
An exit rehearsal imports synthetic or authorised records into a fresh environment, reconciles counts and samples, and records the time and manual work. Add the export and recovery proof to the vendor due diligence paper trail, and review it whenever the supplier changes. The tool implementation guide covers import and cut-over for Shopify and WooCommerce.
Before you act
- Write a state dictionary with events, evidence, actors and next states.
- Put a 30-day delivery alert on every accepted order.
- Set a 14-day refund clock, with the original means of payment.
- Require two people for price changes and large refunds.
- Keep key logs for at least six months and protect them.
- Rehearse an export before you need one.
Common questions
Why is a dashboard label not enough to prove an order event?
The team must know which real event happened, who authorised it and what evidence exists. A label such as paid or fulfilled shows none of that.
What clocks should the order record show?
Delivery within 30 days unless agreed otherwise, the 14-day cancellation period after delivery, and the 14-day refund period. Each needs a start event and an owner.
