-SOLVED- Delay the Order Creation Notification Email

-- url of the page with the problem -- : shop.justducks.co.uk
-- HikaShop version -- : 3.0.0 BUSINESS
-- Joomla version -- : 3.6.5
-- PHP version -- : 5.6.3
-- Browser(s) name and version -- : All

When an order is created and not paid, two emails are sent out.

How can we delay, by at least 10 minutes or more, the Order Creation Notification email.

While "can we help" is a good email to send, sending it instantaneously isn't desired.

Therefore, where can we configure the settings to delay the sending of that email by xxx number of minutes?

Thank you.

Hi,

PHP is a script language: something (like Apache) calls the script (in that case Joomla) to generate a page, and the script returns back the page to be displayed and then exits.
So when HikaShop sends an email to your email server, it has to send it before PHP exits and thus it cannot delay it.
To have HikaShop being able to delay emails would require storing the email in a "queue" table and have a cron to check that queue and send the emails in it after the delay you want. While that would be possible with a custom plugin you could develop, there is no such functionality in HikaShop.
Now, HikaShop only transfers the emails to your email server and it's your email server which sends them to the receiver.
Email servers do have settings to delay emails. For example, for postfix: pintant.cat/2010/04/14/how-to-delay-the-mails-postfix/
But we can't help with that. You need to see that with your server administrator and/or hosting company.

We understand how the email system works.

Our questions was: can we delay the "Can we help" email that follows an order that was created but not completed.

Rather than the customer getting two immediate emails, one for the order creation, the other for "Can we help" at the same time.

The latter should have a variable time delay insomuch as sometimes buyers are interrupted in their purchase.

We would like to send the help email out at some delayed point in the future vs. immediately as Hikashop now does.

Hi,

There is no "can we help" email in HikaShop so I'm not sure what email you're talking about.
When an order is created, HikaShop sends the "order creation notification" email.
And my message always answers your question.
There are two solutions for you to delay that email:
- develop a plugin to store it and send it later
- configure your email server to delay that email
Alternatively, you could disable it, and use instead a HikaShop mass action, or an AcyMailing mass action to send an email with the cron system.

Will use ACYMailing to send the "Can We Help" type of email in 24-hours as the alternative solution.