AST PRO: How to handle partial shipments & split orders

A customer orders five items. Three are in your warehouse and one is coming from a supplier next week. You ship what you have, but WooCommerce only gives you one tracking field and one “Completed” status, so the customer either gets marked complete before everything arrives or sits in the dark wondering where half their order went. Support tickets pile up. Trust erodes.

There’s a better way.

AST PRO — Advanced Shipment Tracking for WooCommerce adds a dedicated “Partially Shipped” order status, lets you attach multiple tracking numbers to a single order, and can assign tracking to specific line items so customers see exactly what shipped and what’s still on the way.

This guide shows you how to set up and run partial shipments and split orders in AST PRO from start to finish.

How to set up partial shipments in AST PRO

1. Enable the Partially Shipped order status
   Go to WooCommerce → Shipment Tracking → Settings and turn on the Partially Shipped status. This registers a new order status alongside WooCommerce defaults, with its own colour label so you can spot split orders at a glance in the orders list.
2. Turn on multiple tracking numbers
   In the same settings area, enable multiple tracking. This removes WooCommerce’s one-tracking-number limit and lets you add several shipments to a single order, each with its own carrier and tracking code.
3. Enable Tracking Per Item
   Open any order, find the Shipment Tracking box, and tick the Tracking Per Item checkbox. This swaps the basic tracking form for a product table where you assign tracking numbers to specific line items in the order.
4. Ship your first batch
   Add a tracking number and select only the items that are physically going out in this shipment. AST PRO records which products were covered and leaves the rest flagged as unshipped.
5. Set the order to Partially Shipped
   Mark the order as Partially Shipped. The status sticks even though items remain outstanding, so the order stays open and the customer is not told the order is complete prematurely.
6. Send the partial shipped email
   AST PRO triggers the Partially Shipped order email, which lists the shipped items, their tracking, and (optionally) the items still on the way. You control the heading, content, product images, and whether unshipped items appear.
7. Ship the remaining items
   When the rest of the stock arrives, add a second tracking number against the outstanding line items. Once every item is covered, move the order to Completed and the customer gets the final shipment notification.

What controls each part of a split order

What the customer sees

Because tracking is mapped per item, the partial shipped email and tracking widget show a clean split: products that have shipped with live tracking, and products still being prepared. The customer never has to guess, and you cut the “where’s the rest of my order” tickets that split fulfilment usually creates.

Conclusion

Partial shipments stop being a workaround and start being a proper workflow once you have a real status, multiple tracking numbers, and per-item assignment working together. AST PRO gives your store all three, so split orders stay accurate for you and transparent for the customer.