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How to Test an Order for BigCommerce?

Last updated: August 01, 2024
Written and researched by experts at AvadaLearn more about our methodology

By Sam Nguyen

CEO Avada Commerce

When opening a brand new business on your own, it is important to make sure that everything knows what they are doing so that your customers can have the best experience while shopping at your place.

In the old days, there was hardly an eCommerce platform that could provide this very function to its users. However, up to this point, if you are one of BigCommerce’s clients, you can quickly examine how your system works anytime.

This article will guide you through How to Test an Order for BigCommerce, from the shipping and taxes to payment methods check-up. If you are interested, read to find out more!

What is a BigCommerce test order?

Placing a test order from your storefront before officially running your online store or after you’ve modified all of your checkout settings is a smart idea. Having a provision for all can help you to check if your expectations are being met, and it will also assist you in understanding your consumers’ buying experience.

In this way, you will be able to ensure that everything goes smoothly from order processing, inventory status update, shipping, emailing, to even taxes. And all of this will cost you nothing; that is the reason why it is recommended that you should take a BigCommerce test order.

How to test Shipping and Tax of a BigCommerce order?

The first element you have to consider when it comes to placing a BigCommerce test order is to check out the Shipping and Tax of your store. Then you can find out whether there are any available problems occurring while your customers are processing orders.

Step 1: Go to View Store page

First thing first, please go to your BigCommerce Control Panel site. Here you will see a blue column on the left side of the screen. Click on the “View Store” just like below:

BigCommerce view store

Step 2: Fill in Shipping information

Choose randomly any of your products, then “Add to cart”:

Adding the product

BigCommerce will ask you whether would you like to add another product or directly checkout, select the “Proceed to checkout” :

Proceed to checkout

Fill in the box with your email address:

Fill in email address

Here comes the Shipping Information form, after all of the boxes are filled, “Estimate Shipping” to seal the deal:

Estimate shipping

Click on a random shipping cost then “Update Shipping cost” button:

Update Shipping Cost

Step 3: Check and solve existing problems

Once you are done, it’s time to “Check out” and continue to keep an eye on other settings of the BigCommerce test order process.

Below is the list of several mistakes or errors you might run into while checking for Shipping and Taxes payment settings:

  • There is a pop-up window saying “Unfortunately one or more items in your cart can’t be shipped to your location. Please choose a different delivery address”
  • It is supposed to appear as delivery quotations like USPS quotes, but for whatever reason they do not turn up on your screen.
  • Nothing happens when you click “Get quote” during the shipping examining process.

If you’ve inserted a mix of items and a mailing address, but the shopping cart is unable to locate a functioning shipping system, these symptoms can occur. Checkout Errors supporting articles written by BigCommerce will help you find out what the problem is and how to fix it.

How to test Payment Gateway of a BigCommerce order?

After deciding the Shipping locations, fees and Taxes, you can now test how your BigCommerce payment gateway works and make sure that everything is functioning well.

There are two ways to conduct this specific test for BigCommerce payment methods:

  • Using BigCommerce Test Payment Gateway
  • Using Payment Gateway integrations

Either one is created to check out whether your payment gateway functions correctly, we will introduce you to both of them and how to set up them steps by steps, please choose the most appropriate strategy for your store:

BigCommerce Test Payment Gateway

This is where you can process the orders without charging a card. You can apply some products you haven’t purchased to your cart until proceeding. Using a valid address to guarantee that postage and tax are measured right on the checkout page as a visitor.

Step 1: Fill in credit card information

After the Shipping Information page, your store will require you to fill in the Payment related information. With the “Credit Card Number” section, use 4111 1111 1111 1111 and “success” for the “Name on Card”. In case Optimized One-Page Checkout is the choice of your business, the form of card would be recognized for you automatically. Pick Visa as the card class if you are using a particular checkout type.

Fill in the information

Step 2: Place Order and check for the result

Following that, enter some additional data such as the expiration date and CVV to finish the process. If you click the “Place Order” button, the BigCommerce test order will be completed and you will be sent to a Thank you landing website. You can quickly see the order in your BigCommerce Control Panel page.

Payment Gateway Integration Test

For this method, you will be acting as an actual customer, which means you also have to fill in your real card information and complete the order just like normal.

The only way to check whether an active payment gateway is functional is to navigate to your test product and connect it to your cart. Using a valid address to guarantee that postage and tax are measured right on the checkout page as a visitor.

Step 1: Fill in your actual information

At the first step, instead of filling in the Payment section with a given card number and name of the card like the BigCommerce Test Payment Gateway, feel free to enter your number, name and type of your currently using a credit card.

Step 2: Place Order and check for the errors

Click on “Place order” to move on the next steps of the BigCommerce test order. Carefully check for your Thank You landing page, the time it took to complete the payment.

Place an order

The worst scenario could happen here is that your transaction was crashed; look in the System Log in your Store Logs to find out the reasons.

Step 3: Refund the Test order

On the other hand, if your order was successfully fulfilled, you would rather go to Orders > View to refund the transaction you have just made.

Final thoughts

To sum up, it has been clearly indicated that a test order plays a crucial role in the success of an online business, and How to set up a BigCommerce test order would not take that much time and effort. We hope that this article has answered all of your questions relating to this very topic!


Sam Nguyen is the CEO and founder of Avada Commerce, an e-commerce solution provider headquartered in Singapore. He is an expert on the Shopify e-commerce platform for online stores and retail point-of-sale systems. Sam loves talking about e-commerce and he aims to help over a million online businesses grow and thrive.

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