Dollarback: Store Credit

Frequently Asked Questions

Getting started

What is Dollarback: Cashback & Store Credit for Shopify?

A cashback and loyalty app for Shopify built on native store credit. No points, no coupon codes, one click redemption at checkout.

Why use Shopify store credit instead of a points based loyalty program?

Points are abstract, and customers often don't know what they're worth or how to redeem them. Store credit is a clear monetary value ("earn $5 on your $20 order") redeemed with one click at checkout instead of a multi step coupon flow. Clearer value plus less friction is what drives repeat purchases.

Is the store credit native to Shopify? Where is my customers' credit stored?

Yes, it's native Shopify store credit, stored directly on the customer object in Shopify rather than an external wallet. It stays attached to the customer's account and can't leak or be shared the way coupon codes can.

How do I set up a cashback program on my Shopify store, and how long does it take?

A basic program (earn rule plus storefront display) takes minutes. Set your cashback rule, choose where rewards show, and configure notifications. Klaviyo and Shopify Flow integrations can be added later without redoing anything.

Earning cashback

Do customers earn cashback on the discounted price or the original price? What about taxes and shipping?

Discounts are always excluded from the calculation, so cashback is never paid on money you didn't receive. For taxes and shipping, you pick the base: order subtotal (excludes both) or order total (includes both). Shipping can optionally be included in subtotal mode, and amounts can be rounded up to whole numbers.

I can't decide between fixed and percentage cashback. Which should I go with?

You don't have to pick one, they can run together. Fixed amounts are predictable and easy to message ("$5 back on every order"). Percentage scales with spend and pushes higher value carts. Where a product qualifies for both, the customer gets the better reward.

I want people to spend more to earn more. Can I do that?

Yes. Order Goals let you set thresholds where larger orders earn larger rewards, which is the cleanest way to use cashback to lift average order value.

Can my best customers earn more than first time buyers?

Yes. Customer Tiers segment customers by orders placed, money spent, or cashback activity, and assign benefits per tier.

If someone pays part of their order with store credit, do they earn cashback on the whole order?

By default, no. They earn on the amount they actually paid, so a customer covering $200 of a $1,000 order with credit earns cashback on $800. You can change this to "no cashback when credit is used" or "cashback on the full order value". The default is the safer setting, since paying cashback on spent credit compounds the cost of the program.

Couldn't someone buy a gift card, earn cashback, then earn again spending it?

Only if you allow it. We recommend disabling cashback on gift card purchases, and separately controlling cashback for orders paid with gift cards, to close the double earn loop.

Can customers use a discount code and still earn cashback on the same order?

Up to you. You can disable cashback for orders using discount codes to prevent stacking. Note this applies to discount codes only, not automatic discounts.

When does the credit actually hit the customer's account? I'm worried about people returning items after earning.

You choose the trigger: Order Created (default), Order Paid, or Order Fulfilled, plus an optional delay of X days after it. If your products have a meaningful return rate, set the delay past your return window. It's the most effective abuse control in the app.

Can I put a limit on how much cashback a single order can earn?

Yes. Cap the payout per order even if the customer qualifies for more, and separately require a minimum cart value before credit can be redeemed, which prevents near zero orders paid entirely with credit.

I don't want staff accounts or wholesale buyers earning cashback. Can I exclude them?

Yes. Customers can be excluded by tag, and exclusion rules also cover specific products and collections.

Can I run cashback just for a weekend sale?

Yes. Set a start and end date on the reward, and combine with credit expiry to create urgency around redemption.

Can I reward reviews with store credit? Which review apps work?

Any review app that supports Shopify Flow triggers. Step by step guides exist for Judge.me, Loox, Vitals, Yotpo, Stamped, REVIEWS.io, Trustoo, Junip, Air, TrustShop and EasyReviews. Note the Judge.me flow only fires for verified reviews submitted through Judge.me's email request.

Does Dollarback do referrals, or do I need a separate app?

It's built in. The Referral Engine rewards referrers with store credit, and Referral Analytics tracks referral orders, commissions and performance with detailed logs.

Can I control which products, variants, or customers earn cashback?

Yes. A cashback configuration can target specific products, variants or collections, and be scoped by order conditions, customer tags and selected sales channels.

How do I stop sale or clearance products from earning cashback?

Create a Shopify smart collection that holds only your full-price products, then point the cashback configuration at that collection so discounted items are left out.

Can I give cashback only on a customer's first order, or their first few?

Yes, using Shopify Flow with an order-count condition. Dollarback's own earn rules apply to every qualifying order, so first-order logic runs through Flow.

A customer didn't get cashback. Why not?

Run through the checklist. Is the earn trigger set? Does the order have a customer attached? Does it pass your product, collection, tag and sales-channel rules? And was a configuration actually live at the time? Dollarback won't backfill orders that came in while everything was switched off.

Can missed cashback be added after the fact?

There's no automatic reprocessing. For a handful of orders, add Shopify store credit manually; for larger corrections, use bulk import or bulk debit.

Redeeming credit

Do customers need to enter a code to use their credit?

No codes. Credit is native Shopify store credit on the customer account, redeemed with one click at checkout. Works at checkout, on POS and on subscriptions.

Can I make credit expire? Will customers get a heads up before it does?

Yes to both. Set expiry on issued credit, and use the Store Credit Expiry Threshold event in Klaviyo or Omnisend for "your credit expires in Y days" flows. Expiry works best with the reminder attached, since the reminder is what drives the repeat purchase.

When are the notifications for the expiry email triggered? Can I configure when these emails are triggered?

By default, expiry reminders go out 7, 3 and 1 day before a customer's credit expires, at the same time of day as the expiry. You're not locked into that schedule. You can set your own timing and add up to 5 separate reminders, each at whatever number of days before expiry you like.

How do I stop people placing $2 orders paid entirely with credit?

Set a minimum cart value for store credit to appear as a payment option.

Do customers need an account and to be logged in?

To earn, the order just needs to be tied to a Shopify customer. To see and redeem the resulting store credit, the customer signs in to that same account using Shopify's new customer accounts.

Can customers spend their credit in Shopify POS?

Yes. Since it's native Shopify store credit, it works in Shopify POS too, as long as the order has a customer attached.

Can I cap how much credit is redeemed, or limit it to certain products?

Dollarback can't currently control the exact amount redeemed or restrict redemption to specific products or collections. You can set a fixed maximum, or hide store credit until the cart reaches a minimum value.

A customer can't see their store credit at checkout. What's wrong?

Check that they're signed in through Shopify's new customer accounts, have a positive balance, and that store credit is enabled. Shop Pay, legacy accounts, payment customizations, or an unsupported gateway can also hide it.

Does store credit work with legacy accounts or Shopify Plus B2B?

Store-credit checkout needs Shopify's new customer accounts, and legacy accounts don't expose store credit at all. Shopify Plus B2B also has some current limitations that can block native store-credit redemption.

Refunds, edits & edge cases

I just refunded part of an order. Does the customer keep the cashback they earned on it?

No, if Order Edit & Refund Handling is enabled (Advanced plan). Refunds automatically debit the customer's credit, order edits are recalculated once the order is marked Paid, and cancellations debit the full credited amount. Every change is logged in the Order Edit History metafield.

What if they've already spent the credit I need to claw back?

The amount you couldn't recover is saved against the customer as a "Balance Adjustment", so the shortfall isn't lost. Next time that customer earns cashback, Dollarback subtracts what they still owe from the new credit before adding it. Over a few orders, the balance evens itself out.

I refunded an order but the cashback didn't adjust. Is something broken?

Probably not. If the refund was issued without selecting line items, the app can't determine what to recalculate, and Shopify itself warns about this ("select items being refunded"). Refund by line item, or edit the order with a discount for partial refunds.

My customer didn't get an email when we took credit back after an order edit. Why not?

Intentional. Order edit and partial refund adjustments don't trigger the standard credited and debited notifications by default, since they differ from normal earn and redeem events.

We reshuffle our collections a lot. Which collection rules count for a given order's cashback?

Collections are checked dynamically at credit time, since catalogs are too large to snapshot. Everything else uses the order time snapshot. For scheduled rewards, recalculation uses order info at the time of credit, and later changes aren't considered.

I just turned on refund handling. Does it work on orders from before?

Yes for regular rewards: refunding or editing an older order after enabling the setting will recalculate its cashback. Scheduled rewards created before the feature was enabled keep the old behavior, where refunds and edits are not supported.

A customer is asking where their credit went. Where do I look?

The Analytics section logs every transaction with the date, customer, order ID, type, expiry, amount and order total. You can also pin the Dollarback metafields (latest cashback, edit history, balance adjustment) to your order and customer pages in Shopify admin. That way your support team sees the same details without opening the app.

Storefront display & customization

Where will customers actually see their balance and rewards?

Product page, cart page, collection page, loyalty page, cashback widget, customer account, thank you page, and custom slide carts. On Shopify Plus, a checkout block shows the exact cashback being earned in real time.

Most of my visitors aren't logged in. Will they see the rewards at all?

It depends on the touchpoint. On the cashback widget, logged-out visitors are asked to sign in before the full reward details are shown. On the product page and cart touchpoints, whether rewards appear to logged-out visitors is controlled per earn rule by the "Show on Online Store when not logged in" toggle.

Can I make the widgets look like the rest of my store?

Yes. The Customization section is a single place for all customer facing messages, styling and widgets, and the product and cart page extensions support custom CSS.

We use a custom slide cart. Will the reward display still work?

Yes. Custom slide cart support is now built into the app, and you set it up from the Integrations section.

If I add store credit from the Shopify admin to a customer, does it get reflected on the widget for the customer?

Yes. The balance on the widget reflects any store credit you add to a customer from the Shopify admin. What it won't show is a log entry, since manual credit or debit made from the admin isn't recorded in the app's activity logs. Those adjustments stay visible only under the customer's store credit balance in the Shopify admin.

How do I show cashback on my storefront?

Add the Dollarback app blocks through the Shopify theme editor on your product, collection, cart and account pages. Custom slide carts or minicarts may need a little theme integration.

The cashback widget is missing, cut off, or stuck calculating. How do I fix it?

Check that the app embed and the relevant app block are enabled, that the mapped collections are active on the Online Store, and that your theme supports app blocks. Theme CSS conflicts, scripts that replace the DOM, caching, and floating widgets can all interfere.

Notifications & integrations

How do customers find out they've earned credit?

Built in email notifications work out of the box, with a configurable sender name. For richer flows, connect Klaviyo or Omnisend, which receive credited, debited and expiry threshold events, or use Shopify Flow.

What does the Klaviyo integration actually send over?

Customer properties like the store credit balance, plus events: Store Credit Credited, Store Credit Debited, and Store Credit Expiry Threshold, each with amount, currency, formatted amount, expiry date and remaining days. Enough to build earn, spend and expiry reminder flows.

There's a weird placeholder profile in my Klaviyo after connecting. Should I be worried?

No, it's expected. A placeholder profile is created before any transactions occur so the properties and events schema is visible while you configure flows. It's safe to ignore.

Omnisend isn't picking up my credit events. How do I get it to sync?

Place a test order (a draft order marked paid works) and check the contact profile. If data still isn't showing, use "Update in Omnisend" inside Dollarback to push manually.

My Shopify Flow "Deposit store credit" action isn't doing anything. What am I missing?

Check the Shopify Flow integration toggle inside Dollarback (Settings → Integrations) first. It's disabled by default, and this is the most common cause. Enable it and re test the workflow.

We're switching from a points app. Can I bring everyone's balances over?

Yes, through Bulk Import. Import balances before announcing the switch so customers never see an empty balance mid migration.

How do I turn on customer notification emails?

Email us from the store's official or verified email or domain, then reply to the verification email we send back. Built-in notifications stay off until that store contact is verified.

How do I import existing store-credit balances?

Use Bulk import with a CSV containing Email, Amount and Currency (a CustomerId column works too). Customers must already exist in Shopify, and re-running an import adds credit again rather than replacing balances.

Does Dollarback work with Shopify Flow?

Yes, on a paid plan. Flow can issue store credit off events like reviews, sign-ups, tags or order conditions.

Will Shopify Flow send the credit email automatically?

Yes. When the credit is issued through Dollarback's own Shopify Flow action, it sends the credit email and also fires an event to your connected integrations (Klaviyo or Omnisend). For credit issued by other external actions, set the notification up in Dollarback or send the event through your integration.

Can Dollarback send its built-in emails from my own domain?

Built-in notifications send from Dollarback's domain. To send from your own domain, route the emails through Klaviyo or Omnisend.

Billing

What does Dollarback cost?

Simple flat-rate plans, with a 7-day free trial on the paid tiers. The Free plan covers up to 200 orders a month. Pro ($29/month) adds the integrations, customer tiers and bulk import. Advanced raises the order volume and adds order-editing and refund handling.

Is there a free trial?

Paid plans include a seven-day free trial. You can confirm the current terms in Shopify admin under Settings → Apps → Dollarback → Billing.

Are the integrations available on the free plan?

No. Shopify Flow, Klaviyo, Omnisend and the other integrations all need a paid plan.

How do I cancel or downgrade Dollarback?

From the app's billing page you can upgrade, downgrade, or cancel your plan as needed. Uninstalling the app also cancels the subscription.

More from DollarLabs

Can DollarLabs also handle my discounts and promotions?

Yes. Dollarlabs: Ultimate Discounts is our Shopify Functions based discount app for automatic and code discounts, BOGO, volume discounts, bundles, tiered offers and bulk unique codes. It pairs naturally with Dollarback: discounts bring the order in, cashback brings the customer back.

We sell wholesale. Do you have something for B2B pricing?

Yes. Dollarlabs: B2B Custom Pricing handles wholesale price lists, volume tiers, case multiples, quick order forms and wholesale signup, without draft orders. Dollarback works alongside it, and can grant store credit at the B2B company location level.

Anything for product bundles specifically?

Yes. Dollarlabs: Bundle Discounts covers tiered bundle offers applied per unit.