WooCommerce Gift Note Process Bug — Root Cause & Fix
Overview
A critical bug in the WooCommerce gift note flow causes incorrect messages to be printed on physical cards and inserted into shipments. The system defaults to the very first gift message ever entered in the store's history, overwriting any new customer input. This results in the wrong card being sent — for example, an anniversary message delivered for a birthday order.
First identified in client context: [1], October 2025.
Root Cause
When a customer purchases the "Personalized Gift Note" add-on ($4.99), the gift message field in ShipStation does not pull the customer's submitted text. Instead, it surfaces the first gift message ever recorded in the system, regardless of what the current customer entered.
This appears to be a data persistence or field-mapping issue between WooCommerce and ShipStation — the personalized note field is not being passed correctly per-order, and a stale default value is being used instead.
Confirmed example: Order #54105 (Tom Baker) — customer submitted a birthday message; ShipStation displayed an anniversary message from a prior, unrelated order.
Compounding Issues
1. Gift Option Hidden Too Late in Checkout
The "Add a personal gift note" option appears only at the checkout screen, after the customer has already committed to their cart. Customers frequently miss it, leading to:
- Orders where the gift note add-on is purchased but no message is submitted
- Confusion about how to ship to a different address (the "Ship to a different address" link is visually weak and easy to overlook)
Recommended fix: Surface the gift/note option earlier — ideally on the product page or cart view — with clear instructional copy (e.g., "Sending this as a gift? Check here to add a personal note and ship to a different address.").
2. Defunct Loom Card-Selection Integration
The website previously embedded a Loom video/widget that allowed customers to browse and select from available greeting card designs. This integration is no longer active. Customers who see it expect to choose a card; in reality, the merchant (Sherry) selects and handwrites a card from her own inventory.
This creates a mismatch between customer expectation and actual fulfillment.
Recommended fix: Remove the Loom embed entirely. Optionally replace with a static description of the handwritten card experience, or explore an alternative embed solution (to be scoped with the developer).
Recommended Remediation Steps
| Priority | Action | Owner |
|---|---|---|
| Critical | Investigate and fix the WooCommerce → ShipStation gift message field mapping so each order's note is passed correctly | Developer |
| High | Move gift/note prompt earlier in the purchase flow (product page or cart) | Developer |
| High | Make "Ship to a different address" more visually prominent (match styling of primary CTA buttons) | Developer |
| High | Remove defunct Loom integration from the gift note UI | Developer |
| Medium | Add instructional copy on product/gift box pages explaining how to send as a gift | Developer / Copywriter |
| Low | Evaluate alternative card-selection embed tools to replace Loom | Developer → Client review |
Interim Workaround
Until the bug is fixed, the merchant should:
- Never rely on the ShipStation gift note field alone. Cross-reference the WooCommerce order detail page, which may show the customer's intended message under the order notes section.
- Contact the customer if no message is visible or if the displayed message looks like a prior order's content.
- Be aware that customers who purchased the gift note add-on but did not fill in a message need to be followed up with proactively.
Related
- [2]
- [3]
- [4] (if exists)