How store credit works

How Shopify's native store credit behaves, what Stork Credit adds on top, and the rules that apply to every credit the app issues.

Stork Credit does not invent its own currency or points system. Every credit it issues is a native Shopify store credit transaction on a customer account.

Native store credit, in short

• A store credit balance belongs to a customer account, not to an order or a code.

• Customers spend it at checkout, where it appears as an available payment method.

• Balances are held per currency. A customer can hold balances in more than one currency, and a balance can only pay for an order in that same currency.

• Shopify can email the customer when credit is added.

• Credit can carry an expiry date, after which the unused balance is no longer spendable.

Because all of this is native, merchants see the balance and its full transaction history on the customer's page in the Shopify admin — with or without Stork Credit installed.

What Stork Credit adds

Shopify lets you add store credit manually, one customer at a time. Stork Credit adds the automation layer around it:

Shopify on its own	With Stork Credit
Credit one customer by hand	Rules that credit automatically when an order is paid
No scheduling	Date-based and repeating campaigns
No bulk tools	CSV import for hundreds or thousands of customers
No triggers	Shopify Flow action and an external webhook endpoint
Nothing shown before checkout	Cart and checkout widgets showing what the order will earn (checkout on Shopify Plus)

Rules that apply to every credit

These hold no matter which part of the app issued the credit.

A customer account is required

Store credit attaches to a customer account. If an order has no customer on it, there is nothing to credit and the automation run is recorded as failed with "No customer ID found".

Stork Credit creates a customer from an email address where it can — CSV imports, the Shopify Flow action, and external webhooks all create a customer if none exists with that email. Order-value automations cannot, because they act on the customer already attached to the order.

Currency

Credit is issued in your shop's primary currency, resolved when the app was installed and refreshed as your shop details change. CSV imports and external webhooks are the exception — both accept an explicit currency per row or per request.

Issuing credit in a currency the customer never checks out in leaves them with a balance they cannot spend. If you sell across multiple currencies, keep credit in the currency that customer actually buys in.

Expiry

Credit can expire. Every issuing path supports it:

• Automations — set on the rule as never, a relative period from when the credit is issued, or a fixed date.

• CSV import — the expires_on column, per row.

• Shopify Flow and external triggers — an expires_on field on the request.

Expiry is set at the moment of issue and cannot be changed afterwards from Stork Credit.

Customer notifications

By default, Shopify sends the store credit notification email. On automations, you can send your own Store Credit Alert email instead. Whether a customer is emailed depends on the source:

Source	Customer emailed?
Order-value automation	Yes by default — can be turned off on the rule
Scheduled automation	Yes by default — can be turned off on the rule
Threshold automation	Yes by default — can be turned off on the rule
CSV import	Per row, via the send_email column
Shopify Flow action	No
External trigger webhook	No

Rounding

Percentage-based credit is rounded to two decimal places. A 2% reward on a €9.90 order is €0.198, issued as €0.20.

Redemption tracking

When a customer pays with store credit, Shopify notifies Stork Credit and the redemption is recorded — the amount, the order, and the customer. This is what powers reporting on how much issued credit is actually being spent, and how much revenue it brings back.

Redemption is recorded automatically. There is nothing to configure.