How Timesact Tags Preorder Orders (and How to Use the Tags)

Timesact tags every order that contains a preorder item automatically at checkout — you don’t tag anything by hand. The tag is added at the order level, so it describes the whole order rather than a single line item, and it’s there the moment the order is created for you to build on downstream.

There are two tags, and knowing which one lands when is what makes them useful for routing, fulfillment, and email. This guide covers exactly when each tag applies and the practical ways stores put them to work once they’re on the order.

The exact casing matters: the tags are written Pre-order and Partial Pre-order with a capital P — reproduce them exactly when you filter on them anywhere, because a lowercase version won’t match.

A pure preorder order carries only Pre-order; a mixed order — one preorder item plus one or more in-stock items — carries both Pre-order and Partial Pre-order. The second tag is added on top of the first, not instead of it, so a mixed order always has the two together.

Here’s why that’s handy. If a customer buys a preordered jacket and an in-stock beanie in the same checkout, that order is tagged Pre-order and Partial Pre-order. You now know at a glance that part of it can ship today and part of it is waiting — which is the core challenge of handling orders that mix in-stock and preorder items. An order tagged only Pre-order is entirely preorder and can be held as a unit.

These order tags are different from product tag automation, and it’s worth keeping them straight. Order tags (Pre-order, Partial Pre-order) are added to orders automatically at checkout to describe what’s inside them. Product tag automation works the other way around: you put a product tag on an item in Shopify, and Timesact watches for it to decide which products go on preorder in the first place.

So one is an input and one is an output. You use a product tag to drive which products go on preorder; Timesact then produces the order tags when those products sell. This article is about the order tags — the signal you get back after a sale.

Because the tags land at order creation, Shopify Flow can act on them right away — hold, route, or retag an order the instant it comes in. A Flow trigger on “order tags contains Pre-order” can place the order on hold, add an internal note, tag it for a specific fulfillment queue, or notify your ops channel, all without anyone watching the orders feed.

A common pattern is to hold anything tagged Pre-order so it doesn’t accidentally ship early, and to flag anything tagged Partial Pre-order for a human to decide whether the in-stock portion ships now or waits for the whole order. Flow is a Shopify-native tool, so this runs on your store with no extra connection to set up.

The order tags are also a reliable preorder marker for external systems. Some ERP, 3PL, and warehouse tools don’t read Shopify’s “Scheduled” or “On Hold” preorder statuses, so the dependable approach is to key those systems off the Pre-order and Partial Pre-order tags instead — hold, release, and retag based on the tag rather than the fulfillment status.

That keeps a clean line between what’s a preorder and what’s ready to pick, which is half the battle when you’re keeping preorder fulfillment organized at volume. Set your downstream system to treat the tag as the source of truth, and preorders stop slipping into the same-day pick list by accident.

Your email platform can segment on these order tags too, since they live on the Shopify order that your ESP already reads. Tools like Klaviyo pick up the Pre-order and Partial Pre-order tags from Shopify, so you can build a flow that only messages preorder buyers — a shipping-timeline update, a “your preorder is on the way” note, or a separate thank-you for mixed orders.

Because the tagging is automatic, the segment stays current on its own: every new preorder order carries the tag, so your audience updates as orders come in without any manual list-building.

The order tags are the downstream result of a standard preorder setup, so there’s nothing extra to switch on for tagging itself — it happens as soon as a preorder item is bought. That preorder is the usual three layers: a template for what the customer sees, an activation rule (an inventory rule or a date window) for when preorder turns on, and a Selling Plan for the purchase option and charge timing. Once that’s live and a preorder sells, Pre-order — and Partial Pre-order on a mixed order — appear on the order automatically, ready for Flow, fulfillment, or email to act on.

The takeaway is that Timesact hands you a clean, automatic signal on every preorder order: Pre-order on all of them and Partial Pre-order on the mixed ones, at the order level, in exact casing. Point Shopify Flow, your fulfillment system, or your ESP at those tags and your preorders route themselves from checkout onward.

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