Cash on delivery for an online shop: how it works and how to accept it

Why cash on delivery leads in Bulgaria

Many Bulgarian buyers prefer to pay once the parcel is in their hands - it removes the "what if it never arrives" worry and matters most for a new shop still building trust. That is why cash on delivery stays the leading payment method for online orders. For the shop it means more completed orders, as long as the process is clean from checkout to reconciliation.

There is a flip side worth knowing from the start. Cash on delivery carries a higher refusal rate than a prepaid order, because the customer has committed nothing until the parcel arrives. That is not a reason to avoid it - in Bulgaria it is the norm - it is a reason to count it in your costs.

It helps to offer both. Cash on delivery for customers who do not know you yet, and card or bank transfer for those who have ordered before. Over time the share of prepaid orders grows on its own, and your cost of returned parcels falls with it.

How cash on delivery works

The customer picks "cash on delivery" at checkout and pays the amount to the courier on delivery - to an address, at an office or at a locker. The waybill is generated automatically with the cash-on-delivery amount, and the courier transfers the collected money to the shop. In ZweiHost the payouts are reconciled against the orders, so you see which parcels are paid without checking spreadsheets by hand.

The money does not arrive immediately, and that surprises most new shops. The courier collects the amount on delivery and transfers it on a schedule - usually within a few working days, depending on your contract. Between the sale and the money in your account there is a window to plan into your working capital, especially if you buy stock upfront.

The courier also deducts a fee for the service, separate from the delivery price. It is small per parcel and adds up at volume, so count it into the product margin rather than treating it as an incidental. In the shop you see both - what the customer paid and what the parcel cost you.

Cash on delivery with every courier

Cash on delivery is built in for all five couriers in ZweiHost. The customer picks a courier and a collection method at checkout, and the cash-on-delivery amount travels with the waybill. So you offer pay-on-delivery whether the customer wants an address, an office or a locker.

The mechanics are not the same everywhere, though, and the difference matters for tax. With Econt, Speedy and Sameday the customer pays cash to a courier licensed for postal money transfers, and that receipt stands in for the fiscal one. With BOX NOW the lockers take no money: payment is by card, through a link sent after dispatch.

The consequence is practical: with a courier without that licence, the obligation to document the sale stays with you. So choosing a courier is not only a question of price and coverage - it also decides whether you owe a fiscal receipt for that order. The full table, with the legal grounds, is in the fiscal-device guide.

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  Offices, addresses and lockers. Cash on delivery, waybills and COD reconciliation.

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  Offices and addresses. Cash on delivery, live rates and automatic shipment statuses.

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  Addresses and easybox lockers. Cash on delivery, waybills and tracking.

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  Locker delivery 24/7. Card payment on collection, reconciled against orders automatically.

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  Address, office and locker. Cash on delivery, live rates and bulk tracking.

How to cut refused parcels

The one downside of cash on delivery is refused parcels - a customer who changes their mind before paying. ZweiHost helps in several ways: you confirm orders before they go to the courier, and the customer can ask to cancel while the parcel has not yet been handed over - exactly the case where a cancellation costs nobody anything. The cash-on-delivery reconciliation then shows at a glance which amounts came in and which did not.

A refused parcel costs double - you pay for the outbound and the return - so it is worth treating as a measurable cost rather than bad luck. If a particular product or price point is refused more often than the rest, that usually says something about the expectations the photograph or the description creates.

The strongest measure is a dull one: call or message before dispatch on the more expensive orders. A short confirmation cuts refusals more than any setting, because most refusals are not malicious - the customer changed their mind, ordered twice, or forgot.

How to switch on cash on delivery

Cash on delivery is available from the lowest plan and is switched on in the payment settings - alongside bank transfer, and on the higher plans card payments too. You connect the couriers with your own accounts, and until then you try the whole flow in test mode: a cash-on-delivery order, a waybill and statuses, with no real shipments and no real money.

Before going live, walk the whole path in test mode: an order with cash on delivery, the waybill, the email to the customer. That shows you what the customer receives and where the amount appears in the admin, before the first real order shows you instead.

Decide too who pays for delivery and whether there is a free-shipping threshold. With cash on delivery a threshold works particularly well, because the customer is already thinking about the total they will hand over on collection - and a larger order dilutes the courier's fee as well.