Guide: Setting Up Your Shipment Statuses

What are Shipment Statuses?

Shipment Statuses are the stages a shipment goes through from creation to delivery (or cancellation/return): “Order received,” “Picked up,” “Out for delivery,” “Delivered,” etc. Every order is always in exactly one status, and that status is what your customers see when they track their order and what tells the courier what action comes next in the app.

This guide covers how to create, edit, reorder, and keep your status flow healthy. If you’re looking for something more specific:

• Want to start from a flow already built for your industry? See Shipment step templates by industry.
• Already have your statuses and just want to change which stage an order moves to when the courier confirms the action? See Customizing the status flow.

Getting to the section

From the side menu, go to System → Shipment Statuses. There you’ll see the full list of your statuses, in the order they appear in the flow.

Permissions: by default, only Admin and Super-admin profiles can create, edit, reorder, or delete statuses; Manager can view them without modifying them. If your organization has customized a profile’s permissions, this may vary — what governs it is the assigned permission, not the profile’s name.

Your default flow

When you create your account, Sistrack already comes with 7 statuses configured (received, pickup, out for delivery, delivered, retry, return, and cancellation) — you don’t need to create anything to start operating. See the full detail in Shipment step templates by industry.

Create a new status

1. From Shipment Statuses, click New Status.
2. Fill in the basic data:
   • Name (e.g., “Quality check”) — what your users see.
   • Subtitle (optional) — a short description.
3. Scroll down to the Special Configuration section. In there you’ll find, in this order:
   • Canonical type — chosen using the guided wizard (see below).
   • Default next stage — which status the order moves to; see Customizing the status flow for the full detail on this field.
4. Turn on the notifications you want to send by email when an order reaches this status (to sender, recipient, or both).
5. Save. A preview on the right shows you how the status will look as you fill in the form.

The Canonical Type wizard

The Canonical type is what tells the system what your status means in Sistrack’s universal language — it’s used for automatic notifications, reports, and compatibility between different parts of the system. Instead of choosing directly from a long list with technical terms, the system guides you with two simple questions:

1. “What happens to the shipment at this status?” — choose between Still in progress, Delivered, or Closed without delivery.
2. “At what point of the journey does this happen?” — this second question only appears if you answered Still in progress, and lets you choose between Pre-shipment, First mile, Trunk transit, and Last mile.

With those answers, the system shows you a handful of options with simple descriptions (for example: “The courier already has the package in hand”). If you need the technical detail for integrations, each option has a collapsible text with the industry-standard equivalent — but you don’t need to read it to configure your flow.

⚠️ Use only one status per canonical type. The system lets you create two with the same type, but it’s not a good idea: it wouldn’t be able to tell which one to move the order to. It’s even worse with “Delivered” and “Picked up” — as soon as you assign that type to a second status, the first one stops working as your delivery or pickup status, without warning you. Recurring moments (for example, passing through several distribution centers) are logged as events in the history, not as separate statuses.

Edit an existing status

Click Edit on any status in the list. You’ll be able to change its name, canonical type, next stage, and notifications.

⚠️ Changing your delivery status’s canonical type asks for extra confirmation. If the status you’re editing is the one you use as “Delivered,” changing its canonical type would prevent couriers from completing deliveries until another status has that type. The system explicitly warns you before letting you save that change.

View a status’s detail (read-only)

If your role has view-only access, or you simply want to review a status without editing it, click View Details. You’ll see the same information as in Edit (canonical type, where it moves to next, configured notification channels) but without being able to modify it.

Reorder your statuses (drag and drop)

From the list, drag any status to its new position using the drag handle. The new order saves automatically.

💡 Made a mistake? After reordering, a temporary notice appears with a button to undo the change — you don’t need to manually redo the drag if you change your mind.

The order in the list is purely visual (it defines, for example, “step 3 of 7”). Don’t confuse this with “which status the order moves to,” which is configured separately — see Customizing the status flow.

Delete a status

Click the row’s actions menu → Delete. The system asks for confirmation.

Two cases where it won’t let you delete a status:

• It’s your last active status (all others are final ones like “Delivered,” “Canceled,” etc.). Without at least one active status, new orders would be born already closed — create another active status first.
• (If the status you’re trying to delete is your “Delivered” status, the system will let you delete it, but it clearly warns you that deliveries will be frozen until you define another status with that type.)

The health indicator for your flow

Above the status list you’ll see a panel telling you whether your flow is complete or needs attention. If everything’s in order, you’ll see “Your flow is complete and functional.” If something’s missing, you’ll see “Your flow needs attention” with detail on each pending point:

Each notice has a direct action button when applicable, so you don’t have to manually search for what’s missing.

💡 The panel warns, it doesn’t block. Not even critical notices stop you from saving changes or operating — they’re a diagnostic so you know what your flow is missing. You’ll see the consequence of ignoring a critical one in your operation (deliveries that can’t be completed), not in an error message while configuring.

Confirm the canonical type

If at some point the system assigned a canonical type automatically (for example, when migrating historical data), you’ll see a “Needs review” mark on that status. Two ways to resolve it:

• One by one: from the row’s menu, Confirm type — if the assigned type is correct, one click is enough.
• All at once: the Confirm all button confirms all statuses that already have a type assigned, in one go. Ones that don’t have any yet remain pending — you do need to review those individually from Edit.

The interactive flow diagram

The View flow button opens a visual diagram of all your statuses and where each one moves to. It’s useful for reviewing your entire flow at a glance, especially if you have retries or jumps between non-consecutive stages.

• Lines between statuses show the configured transitions — if a status has no line coming out of it (and it’s not a final status), you’ll see a notice right there indicating it’s missing a transition.
• Lines that go backward (for example, from “Not delivered” to “Out for delivery”) represent a retry.
• Click any status in the diagram to see its detail and, if you have edit permission, directly change which status it moves to — without leaving the diagram.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I have two statuses with the same canonical type?

The system doesn’t stop you, but it’s not recommended: it wouldn’t be able to tell which one to move the order to when an event of that type occurs. With “Delivered” and “Picked up” the consequence is concrete and silent — the last status you assign the type to becomes the one the system uses, and the previous one stops serving that function. Recurring moments (several distribution centers, several customs checkpoints) are logged as events in the history rather than separate statuses.

What happens if I leave a status without a canonical type?

The status will keep working for your users, but it won’t appear in grouped reports or trigger automatic notifications that depend on the canonical type. We recommend always assigning one.

My flow has a “status with no exit” notice but it’s intentional — do I have to fix it?

Not necessarily. That notice warns that, upon reaching that status, the courier won’t have an action button in the app and only you’ll be able to move the order from the panel. If that’s exactly what you want (for example, a stage that requires your manual review before continuing), you can leave it as is — the notice stays as a reminder, it doesn’t block anything.

Can I delete my “Delivered” status?

Yes, but the system will clearly warn you: as long as no other status has the “Delivered” type, couriers won’t be able to complete deliveries and those orders will be frozen. Make sure to create the replacement before (or right after) deleting it.

Does confirming the canonical type change anything about my orders?

No. Confirming just tells the system “yes, this type is correctly assigned” and removes the pending-review mark — it doesn’t move orders or change any other data about the status.

What’s the difference between “order in the list” and “next stage”?

The order in the list (drag and drop) is purely visual — it defines what step number you see on screen. The “default next stage” is what actually determines which status an order moves to when the courier confirms the action from the app. You can have a tidy visual order while also having transitions that skip steps or go backward (like a delivery retry).

See also

• Shipment step templates by industry
• Customizing the status flow
• Logging events