Customers and companies

Customers are the people who buy from you. They never sign in to Orbit. They can check out as guests with their email address, or make an account in your shop and sign in with an emailed code. Companies group the customers who buy for a business, and decide the prices and payment terms those customers get. Editors and Admins can add and change customers, companies and price lists; everyone can see them.

Customers

A customer is added the first time someone places an order with their email address, and updated with every order after: their name, phone, the delivery addresses they used, how many orders they placed and how much they spent in each currency.

You can also add a customer yourself under Customers, for example to put a buyer in a company before their first order. Each customer has:

• Email, which is how Commerce Orbit recognises them. Two customers can't share one.
• Name and phone
• Company, for business buyers
• Marketing: whether they agreed to hear from you. Commerce Orbit doesn't send marketing email itself.
• Note for your team

A customer's page lists their orders and whether they have a shop account. Search customers by name or email.

Shop accounts

Anyone can make an account in the hosted shop under Sign in, or on your own website if it uses the storefront API. They type their email address and get a 6-digit code by email that works for 10 minutes. There is no password. The first code makes the account; a customer who already ordered with that address keeps their history.

The login is always the email address. Signed in, a customer sees their own prices and terms at every step, from the product lists to checkout, and doesn't need a code at checkout. Sessions last 30 days, and signing out ends them.

In their account, customers can:

• see every order with its status and tracking, download the receipt or invoice, and select Order again to put the same products back in the cart at today's prices;
• keep an address book with a default delivery and billing address, which checkout fills in for them. Addresses they order with are added by themselves;
• change their name, phone number and whether they want marketing emails. The customer page shows when they agreed or stopped;
• ask you to delete their account.

When a customer asks to delete their account

You get a notification, and the customer page says when they asked. Select Close the shop account within a month: they are signed out everywhere, and their saved addresses, phone number, tags and marketing consent are removed. Their orders and invoices stay, as you need them for your accounts. Select Set aside if you have agreed something else with them. Admins and Editors can also close an account without a request.

Tags

Give customers tags such as wholesale or trade-fair-2026 under Edit. Tags are for your team only and are the simplest way to group customers in a segment.

Companies

Companies, price lists and orders on invoice are in the Growth and Enterprise plans. See Plans and the trial.

Add a company under Companies for each business that buys from you, such as an outdoor shop that stocks Northwilds gear. Then link its buyers: open each customer and choose the company.

When a buyer signs in, the shop takes on their company's prices and terms. Typing an email address at checkout isn't enough. Each company has:

VAT number checks

When you save a company with a VAT number from an EU country, Commerce Orbit checks it with the EU's VIES service. The company page shows whether it is valid, the name and address VIES holds for it, and the consultation number, which is your proof that you checked. Select Check again to ask VIES once more. Orders from a company whose number isn't valid are charged VAT. See Shipping and taxes.

Price lists

A price list gives a company different prices. Make them under Price lists:

• Percentage off: such as 15% off every product, in every currency. Good for a trade discount.
• Fixed prices: a price for chosen variants, such as €219 for the Storm shell jacket. Fixed prices are in your main currency; variants you don't price, and orders in other currencies, use the normal price.

A price list can also have volume tiers, such as 5% more off from 10 of a product, and a quantity per order, such as trade orders of at least 10. See Volume prices and quantity rules.

Discount codes still work on top of a price list. The cart and order show the normal price next to the price the company pays.

Link a customer or company to MAM

When the MAM integration is on, a MAM account number, such as NW1001, can be linked to a company or to one customer. Open the company or the customer and use MAM account on the right. While MAM is off, that section has a link to switch it on under Settings › MAM integration. Link it to the company when everyone who buys for it uses the same account, which is usual. Link it to a customer when that person has an account of their own; it then counts instead of their company's.

Commerce Orbit asks MAM whether the account exists before it saves the link, and refuses a number MAM doesn't know. If MAM can't be reached, try again later. Several customers can belong to one company, and one company to one MAM account. To unlink, choose Unlink.

What a linked customer sees

While a customer of a linked company, or a linked customer, is signed in:

• every price is the account's own price from MAM, on product lists, collections, search, product pages, the cart and checkout, on your website and in the hosted shop. The normal price shows struck through, with "Your price".
• stock is MAM's live stock, branch by branch, with the account's own branch first.
• checkout asks MAM once more. If a price changed since the cart showed it, the customer is told what changed and places the order again.
• orders go to MAM under the account, with the prices the customer paid, net of VAT.

Commerce Orbit asks MAM for many products at once and keeps each account's answers for a short time (90 seconds unless you change it), so browsing is quick and MAM isn't asked for every page. If MAM is slow, a page waits a moment and then shows your normal price, marked "Standard price: your account price couldn't be checked just now", and never a price that might be wrong. Only a part whose number matches exactly gets MAM's price. When MAM is switched off, linked customers see their company's price list instead. See The MAM integration.

Account prices are in your main currency. A customer who switches to another currency sees your prices in it.

On stop and credit limits

The customer and company pages show what MAM says about the account now: its name and whether it is on stop, with the credit limit, balance and branch from the last check. Accounts are checked again every night.

• On stop: the customer can still sign in and see their prices, but can't order on invoice. They see "Your account is on hold, so you can't order on account at the moment." and can pay by card. A card order from an account on stop goes to MAM on the web account, with a comment naming the trade account.
• Over the credit limit: when an order on invoice would take the account over its limit, the customer is warned that it may be held until a payment comes in, and the order's history says so. The order isn't stopped.

When a customer asks to link an account

A signed-in customer who isn't linked can ask for it from Your account in the shop, by typing their account number and a note. Nothing changes for them yet: a number typed by a customer never gives prices on its own. Admins and Editors get an Account request notification. On the customer's page, check with the account holder that this person may buy on it, then choose Approve and link or Decline.

Test as a customer

Test as this customer on a customer's page, and Test as this company on a company's, shows the prices and stock they would see for a dozen MAM products, side by side with your normal prices, live from MAM. It only looks: nothing is saved.