Fulfilment Policy
What It Is
A fulfillment policy describes the conditions under which Commerce can authorize delivery of a sale. It brings financial eligibility, staff approval, application readiness and later reversal response into one configuration. Staff use it to express how a product should be handled within their workspace. A policy can apply to a product, an ordering profile or the workspace default, allowing common settings with more specific choices where needed.
The configured record and the policy retained on an obligation serve different purposes. Configuration supplies the choice for new work. The saved gate preserves the policy selected for a particular sale, including where it came from and its version. That gives operations staff context when an older order behaves differently from a sale placed after a configuration change. A later application of configuration is an explicit action rather than an automatic consequence of editing the policy.
What It Is Not
An ordering profile describes how selling and payment are organized; it is not itself the saved delivery gate. A return policy governs what can come back and how the return is handled. The delivering application's preparation requirements are also separate inputs. Configuring delivery eligibility does not establish that the owning application can perform every requested outcome or that every observed setting has Product approval.
How It Is Used
Administrators configure policies through service operations. Staff investigating a delayed delivery read the resulting gate rather than assume today's configuration governs an older sale. Policy application lets administrators deliberately revisit some waiting work and record why. Its bounded implementation needs careful operational handling: repeated calls do not provide a continuation cursor through all waiting entries. The product should explain the scope examined and the work still awaiting review.
Its Facets
Money condition. Financial eligibility selects immediate delivery, full payment, amount, percentage, paid deposit or no financial condition. Understanding money condition in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Approved terms. A policy can permit approved terms to satisfy the full-payment condition. Understanding approved terms in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Approval required. Required approval reserves an explicit staff release before delivery. Understanding approval required in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Application readiness. Application readiness supplies a prerequisite from the owning delivery service. Understanding application readiness in the fulfilment policy workflow.
After a reversal. Reversal treatment selects staff review, notification, suspension, cancellation follow-up or no action. Understanding after a reversal in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Bank-debit timing. Bank-debit eligibility can use processor acceptance or final settlement. Understanding bank-debit timing in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Follow parent. A child can follow the parent's gate unless its saved setting changes that dependency. Understanding follow parent in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Scope and precedence. Configuration resolution selects product, profile, workspace or built-in policy in that order. Understanding scope and precedence in the fulfilment policy workflow.
Frozen version. An obligation retains the chosen policy version and selection source. Understanding frozen version in the fulfilment policy workflow.
How It Relates
Obligations retain and evaluate the policy. Orders and ordering profiles provide selection context, while Accounting provides the financial position used for evaluation. A reversal can create enforcement or an operational review. The delivering application can add its preparation requirements without becoming the owner of Commerce's policy configuration.
What It Could Become
The product should provide a policy editor and a preview of affected waiting orders. Product authority remains unsettled for much of this configuration despite its implementation evidence. Before extending policy application to large scopes, design should address continuation and distinguish deliberate policy changes from the safeguards retained at placement.