What is a Despatch Note


Once an order is processed in Linnworks, the system can send a despatch note to the channel so that the order is marked as Shipped, and Tracking number (if available) along with the selected Shipping Vendor will be submitted to the channel. In order to achieve this, the corresponding option needs to be enabled in Channel Integration settings.


How to enable and check Despatch Notes


To enable Despatch Notes, you need to go to Settings > Channel Integration > Edit Channel Details > Order > Despatch Notes. This setting needs to be enabled individually for each channel. 



  • Information about Despatch Notes is stored in the Audit Trail of the order. In order to check whether Linnworks has submitted it to the channel, you need to go to Processed Orders > right-click on the order > View > View Order > Audit Trail. If the Despatch Note was sent, you will be able to see a record along the lines of Order Despatch Submitted.
  • There may also be a record stating that order despatch has failed. The system usually indicates a reason for the failure in the same Audit Trail record.
  • If the entry says something along the lines Despatch note ignored, then it either means that the setting or the whole channel was disabled when the order was processed.

Despatch Notes are enabled but were not sent


1. The Despatch Notes setting must be enabled before the order is processed.

As a rule, Linnworks will not send Despatch Notes if the option was enabled after the order was processed. However, this is not true for all channels with the notable exception currently being eBay. So if you want to make sure that Despatch Notes are not sent to the channel in some situation, please discuss it with our Technical Support team first.


2. The original items must remain in the order.

For a lot of channels, Despatch Notes will not be submitted to the channel if original items in the order were removed and/or replaced. As a rule, issues like that can happen with Amazon, Magento, eBay and other channels which use the item reference number in Despatch Notes and allow you to mark separate items in the order as shipped. If you change the order item, it will no longer have the original channel reference number and the order on the channel will not be marked as shipped automatically.


3. The order Source channel must be enabled during order processing.

In order for the Despatch Notes to be sent, the channel itself also has to be enabled at the time of order processing. Whether there were issues with the channel, e.g. eBay token expiry or Amazon API authorization expiry, which disabled the channel, Linnworks will not send the Despatch Notes to the orders that were processed during the time the channel was disabled.


Despatch timestamp


Please keep in mind that when Linnworks sends Despatch Notes, it also sends the current timestamp to the channel. If an order has previously been processed on the channel manually and then later processed in Linnworks, then the Despatch Note from Linnworks will overwrite the original timestamp. This can lead to issues with late despatch on certain channels. Therefore, we recommend to only handle order processing via Linnworks.


Supported vendors


Several, if not most, channels have an internal list of supported vendors When the Postal Service on the order processed in Linnworks has a Vendor name that the channel does not recognize, the despatch notes as a whole or the tracking number may be rejected or not displayed properly. For full channel-specific requirements and lists of supported vendors per channel, please check the links provided below.


Channel-specific info


Whether you are having issues with Despatch Notes and none of the above general troubleshooting steps has been helpful, please see the below links for channel-specific details and troubleshooting for Despatch Notes: