Basic settings for a WooCommerce store

What you'll achieve

• the store shows prices in the right currency and has your company's address;
• customers see the shipping cost for their area;
• it has the payment methods you accept;
• you receive the order emails from the store's address;
• you finish with a test order, from start to finish.

Before you start

• WooCommerce is installed and active (see WooCommerce store: plan, installation and settings).
• Have at hand: your company details, the shipping costs you agreed with your courier, the payment methods you want, and an email address on the store's domain (see How to create an email account in Enhance).
• Back up the website first: in Enhance, on the website page, the “Backups” tab » “Create backup” (with the language set to “English (US)”, “Backup now”).

The steps

A. General

1. Open WooCommerce » Settings » General.
2. Under Store Address, fill in your company's address.
3. Under Selling location(s) and Shipping location(s), choose the countries you sell to, for example only your own country.
4. Under Currency options, choose your currency, for example Euro or Romanian leu, the symbol position, the thousand separator, the decimal separator and the number of decimals (usually 2).
5. Turn on Enable tax rates and calculations only if you need to display and calculate VAT. If you check it, the Tax tab appears, where you fill in the rates together with your accountant.
6. Click Save changes at the bottom of each tab.

B. Products

7. Under Products, choose the unit for weight and dimensions (kg, cm). Some couriers calculate the price based on them.
8. Decide whether you want product reviews and whether only customers who bought the product can leave them.

C. Shipping

9. Under Shipping, click Add zone. Give it a name, for example “Domestic”, and choose the regions.
10. In the zone, add the shipping methods (Add shipping method):
    • Flat rate: the same price for any order in the zone;
    • Free shipping: you can require a minimum order amount;
    • Local pickup: the customer comes to you.
11. If you have different zones (for example your city and the rest of the country), create a zone for each. The order of the zones matters: WooCommerce picks the first one that matches the customer's address.

Integration with a specific courier (shipping labels, parcel tracking) is done with that courier's plugin; follow its instructions.

D. Payments

12. Under Payments, turn on the methods you accept. Out of the box you usually have:
    • Direct bank transfer: fill in the IBAN and the bank; the order stays “On hold” until you see the money;
    • Cash on delivery: payment to the courier on delivery;
    • card payments are added through the plugin of the payment processor you choose, with your account there.
13. Card payments require the website on https://, with a valid certificate (see The free SSL certificate (Let's Encrypt)).

E. Accounts and privacy

14. Under Accounts & Privacy, decide whether customers can order without an account (guest checkout). For a small store, guest checkout usually means more completed orders.
15. Choose the privacy policy page and check the texts shown at registration and at checkout.
16. Under Personal data retention, you can set after how long inactive accounts and old orders are deleted. Decide together with your accountant: orders and invoices have legal retention periods (see also GDPR for a small website: cookies and privacy).

F. Emails

17. Under Emails, at the bottom, under Email sender options, enter the store's name and an address on your domain, for example comenzi@magazinul-tau.ro. A Gmail address here makes the emails end up in spam (see Why my emails go to spam: SPF, DKIM, DMARC).
18. In the list at the top, open each email (new order, processing order, completed order and the others) and check the recipient and subject. New order is the email that comes to you: enter the address where you want to be notified of orders.

G. Store pages

19. Under Advanced » Page setup, check that the Cart, Checkout, My account and Terms and conditions pages are selected. With the terms page selected, customers check it when they order.
20. Pages an online store usually has, to discuss with your lawyer or accountant: the terms and conditions of sale, delivery, the 14-day right of withdrawal (in the EU) and the company details in the page footer. Stores in Romania also display the SAL pictogram of the Romanian consumer protection authority (ANPC), linking to https://reclamatiisal.anpc.ro/.

H. The test order

21. From a private window, add a product to the cart and complete the order with Direct bank transfer or Cash on delivery.
22. Check: the shipping cost is correct, you received the New order email, the test customer received the confirmation, and the order appears in WooCommerce » Orders.
23. Then delete the test order, so it doesn't skew your reports.

If something doesn't work

• At checkout you see “No shipping options were found”. The customer's address doesn't match any zone, or the zone has no method. Check the zones from step 9 and their order.
• Order emails don't arrive or land in spam. Check the sender address (step 17) and SPF, DKIM and DMARC (see Why my emails go to spam: SPF, DKIM, DMARC). If they aren't sent at all, see Email isn't sent or doesn't arrive: common errors.
• The cart empties itself or shows someone else's products. The cart has been cached. Exclude the store pages in your cache plugin (see Caching in WordPress: what it is and how to use it).
• Prices show a period instead of a comma. Change the separators in step 4.
• The checkout page is slow. See Slow website: what to check, in order and, for high-traffic stores, the section about the plan in WooCommerce store: plan, installation and settings.