A failed order recovery flow helps you recover revenue from orders that failed during payment. By sending a series of timed emails, you can encourage customers to retry their purchase—and with the right suppression filters, you can automatically stop sending if they've already succeeded.
This guide shows you how to build a multi-email failed order recovery flow in Metorik Engage, including the critical suppression logic that prevents you from emailing customers who've already completed their purchase.
Before setting up automations, make sure you've completed Setting up Engage with your sending domain and preferences.
How the Flow Works
A failed order recovery flow consists of multiple automation emails, each triggered at different times after an order fails:
Email 1: Sent shortly after the order fails (e.g., 1 hour)
Email 2: Follow-up reminder (e.g., 24 hours)
Email 3: Final attempt (e.g., 48 hours)
The key is adding a suppression filter to each delayed email. This filter checks whether the customer has placed a successful order since their failed order—and if they have, the email won't send.
Setting Up the First Email
Start by creating the first email in your recovery flow, which sends soon after an order fails.
Create a new Order automation
Go to Automations and click New Automation. Choose Create from scratch.
Select Orders as the resource type. This ensures the automation triggers based on order status changes, not customer or cart events.
Give your automation a clear name like "Failed Order Recovery - Email 1 (1 hour)" so you can easily identify it in your automation list.
Define the trigger conditions
In the Define your Audience step, add filters to target failed orders with a delay:
Order status is failed
Order failed over [X hours/days] ago
The "over" filter creates the delay. For example, setting "Order failed over 1 hour ago" means the email won't send until at least 1 hour has passed since the order failed.
You can also add additional filters to target specific types of orders:
Order total is greater than [amount] — Prioritize recovering higher-value orders
Payment method is [method] — Target specific payment failures
Items contains [product] — Recovery emails for specific products
Add suppression logic
Add a filter to prevent sending to customers who've already placed a successful order:
Add a Customer filter
Choose Customer in segment
Set the operator to is not in
Select or create a segment for customers with recent successful orders
For example: Customer is not in segment: Customers with successful orders in past 24 hours
This filter is evaluated at send time, not just when the automation triggers. If a customer places a successful order during the delay period, they won't receive the recovery email.
You can create a saved segment for "Customers with successful orders in past [X] hours/days" and reuse it across your flow emails. Adjust the time window based on your longest delay—for a 48-hour flow, use a 48-hour or 72-hour window.
Create and activate the email
Design your recovery email using the Email Builder. Include:
A clear subject line referencing their order
A link to retry the purchase (use the order payment URL variable)
Helpful support contact information
For complete details on designing emails, see Building an Automation.
When activating, choose to send to future matches only to avoid emailing customers about old failed orders.
Creating Follow-up Emails
Once your first email is active, create the follow-up emails with longer delays. Each email needs its own automation with different timing and suppression filters.
Duplicate the first automation
From the Automations page, click the three-dot menu on your first email and select Duplicate.
Duplicating preserves your filters and email content, saving you from rebuilding everything from scratch.
Update the delay filter
Change the "Order failed over" filter to your new delay period:
Rename the automation to match (e.g., "Failed Order Recovery - Email 2 (24 hours)").
Adjust the suppression window
Update the customer segment filter to match or exceed the delay period. For a 24-hour follow-up, use a suppression window of at least 24-48 hours. For a 48-hour follow-up, use 48-72 hours.
This ensures customers who succeeded within the recovery window won't receive unnecessary emails.
Modify the email content
Adjust the email copy for each follow-up. Later emails might include:
Stronger urgency or a time-limited discount
Different messaging acknowledging previous attempts
Alternative support options (phone, live chat)
Why Failed Order Recovery Doesn't Show Conversions
Metorik attributes conversions to the order that was actually placed, not the failed order that triggered the email. When a customer retries and succeeds, the new successful order is a separate order in your system.
While the automation metrics won't show direct conversion revenue, you can measure the flow's effectiveness by:
Comparing your failed order rate before and after implementing the flow
Tracking click-through rates on the retry links in your emails
Using the segmenting system to identify customers who received recovery emails and later placed orders
Tips for Better Recovery Rates
Timing matters: Start with a short delay (30-60 minutes) while the purchase intent is fresh, then follow up at 24 and 48 hours.
Keep it simple: Make retrying the purchase as easy as possible. Include a direct payment link in the email.
Offer help: Some failures are due to technical issues or confused customers. Include support contact options.
Consider incentives: For high-value orders, a small discount in later follow-ups can motivate customers to retry.
Segment by value: Create separate flows for different order values—high-value orders might deserve more follow-ups or stronger incentives.
Next Steps
