Cash on delivery is not a checkbox
Most platforms treat it as a note on the order. Done properly it is a payment method, a courier instruction and an accounting entry.
Ask a platform whether it supports cash on delivery and the answer is almost always yes. Ask what happens after the customer clicks it, and the answers separate quickly.
The checkbox version
The order is created as unpaid with a note saying the customer will pay on delivery. Everything after that is manual: you tell the courier how much to collect, you mark the order paid when the money lands, you reconcile the settlement by hand. It works at ten orders a week and quietly breaks at a hundred.
What it should do instead
- Travel to the courier. The amount to collect belongs on the shipping label, not in your head.
- Be zero when the customer already paid by card. If a paid order still carries a collection amount, the courier will ask again — and the customer will pay.
- Reconcile automatically. The settlement from the courier should close the orders it covers, not produce a spreadsheet.
- Appear correctly on the invoice. In Romania this is not optional; the invoice has to be issued and filed either way.
The failure that costs most
Double collection. A card-paid order that goes out with a collection amount attached means the buyer pays twice, discovers it later, and files a complaint you will lose. It is a one-line bug and a disproportionate amount of damage, which is why it is worth asking about specifically.