A fake order is an order that was never meant to be delivered: a fake number, a fake address, a test, a prank, a curious competitor. In cash-on-delivery, it looks exactly like a real one — right up until the courier comes back with the parcel. Here is how to spot it before you ship, what WhatsApp confirmation filters out on its own, and how to check a customer you have never seen before.
What is a fake COD order?
A fake COD order is an order placed with no real intention to buy: an invented or mistyped number, a fake address, a ghost customer, a test by someone curious or by a competitor, an accidental duplicate. Because the customer pays nothing at checkout, nothing stops them — and nothing tells it apart from a genuine order until you verify.
- The fake number
- A random string, one digit too many or too few, a number that never existed. Nobody will pick up, nobody will receive.
- The fake address
- A valid number but an empty, invented address, or one in a different city from the one selected. The courier drives around, then gives up.
- The ghost order
- A real customer, a real address, but no real intent: a midnight impulse, curiosity about the price, a wish to "see". They will not answer again.
- The duplicate
- The customer clicked twice, or ordered the same item from two ads. In good faith — but ship both and one comes back.
- The malicious order
- A competitor or a prankster ordering to make you lose shipping money. Rare, but expensive when it repeats.
What a fake order really costs you
A fake order you ship costs outbound and return shipping, ties up the product for the whole trip, keeps your team busy (packing, calls, tracking) and distorts your numbers. Zero sales against it. A few fake orders a day are enough to eat the margin of the orders that actually get delivered.
It is the RTO mechanism — return to origin — applied to orders that should never have left. The full math of what a return costs, and the levers to reduce it, are in the anti-returns guide. Here we go after the most avoidable part: the orders you simply should not have shipped.
The signals that give a fake order away
The most reliable signals: a number that does not match the Moroccan format, an empty address or one inconsistent with the city, several orders from the same number within minutes, an abnormal quantity, and above all a customer who stays unreachable after two follow-ups. A single signal is enough to trigger a check before shipping.
- The number. In Morocco a mobile number starts with 06 or 07 and has ten digits (numbering plan of the ANRT, the telecom regulator). A number that is too short, a string like 0612345678, or a landline for a home delivery deserve a doubt.
- The address. Empty, reduced to a neighbourhood, or contradicting the selected city. An address your courier could not find, you will not find either.
- Repetition. Two, three, ten orders from the same number within minutes — a duplicate at best, a test or an attack at worst.
- Quantity. Twelve units of a product people buy one at a time, or a basket ten times your average. It happens — but it gets confirmed by voice.
- Silence. No reply to the confirmation message, nor to the follow-up two hours later, nor to the one at four hours. The most reliable signal of all.
- History. A number that has already refused or cancelled orders — with you, or with other merchants. More on that below.
Confirmation: the first filter against fake orders
Confirming before shipping eliminates most fake orders: a fake number has no active WhatsApp, a prankster does not tap "confirm", a duplicate stands out, and address validation fixes honest mistakes. An order that was never confirmed does not ship — that is the rule that protects your margin.
On WhatsApp the filter is almost free. The moment the order lands, an official message (a template approved by Meta — see the WhatsApp Business documentation) goes out with three buttons: confirm, edit address, cancel. The real customer answers in one tap, often within the minute. The fake number receives nothing. The ghost customer does not reply — and two follow-ups later the order is cancelled without having cost a dirham of shipping.
That is exactly what UpConfirm's order confirmation via WhatsApp does: an official template the moment the order lands, automatic follow-ups at 2h and 4h, address validation, duplicate detection, then hand-off of the confirmed order to the carrier. Merchants using it confirm 92 % of their orders — a good share of the remaining 8 % are the fake orders you just avoided shipping. Selling on YouCan or Shopify? The store connects in under two hours, no developer needed.
Checking the customer before shipping: the shared history
The repeat offender — who orders, refuses the parcel, then orders elsewhere — is invisible in your own history if they never ordered from you. UpConfirm's customer Trust Score computes a confidence score from that customer's history across the whole network of UpConfirm merchants, notably their delivered, refused and cancelled orders. A risky order is flagged before it ships.
The idea is simple: instead of discovering a bad payer at your own expense, you benefit from the experience of every merchant in the network. A customer who refused three parcels this month at three different stores arrives at yours with their score — and your order goes to "to verify" before it leaves for the courier.
How to use it without losing real sales
- A score is not a verdict. It tells you where to look, not what to refuse. A risky order gets confirmed by a call; a reliable one ships without friction.
- Prioritise. Ship confirmed, high-score orders first — those are the ones that get delivered. Handle the doubtful ones separately, calmly.
- Feed the history. Every return reason you record (unreachable, refused, fake address) sharpens the score for you and for everyone else.
The customer Trust Score is included in every plan, in the same place as automatic dispatch to carriers and parcel tracking: the customer card, before you click "ship".
Seven simple rules against fake orders
Seven rules remove most of the problem: never ship without confirmation, follow up twice then cancel, validate address and city, deduplicate by number, block repeat offenders, handle abnormal baskets by voice, and record the reason for every return. None of them needs a developer.
- 1
Zero shipping without confirmation — an unconfirmed order does not exist for your courier. This is the rule that outweighs all the others.
- 2
Two follow-ups, then cancel — at 2h and 4h after the order. Beyond that, the ghost customer will not come back; cancel and free the stock.
- 3
Address and city validated — at confirmation time, not at delivery time. The customer corrects it in one message; the courier does not drive around.
- 4
Deduplicate by number — before dispatch. Two identical orders within the hour = one to ship, after asking.
- 5
Block repeat offenders — two refusals or cancellations after confirmation, and the number goes to systematic manual verification.
- 6
Abnormal baskets by voice — unusual quantity or high amount: a thirty-second human call before shipping, always.
- 7
Return reason recorded — unreachable, refused, fake address, product: this is the data that feeds the score and stops you repeating the same mistake.
Measuring: the share of fake orders in your return rate
Track two numbers every week: the share of orders cancelled for lack of confirmation (never shipped, so zero cost) and the share of returns whose reason is "unreachable" or "refused". If the second one drops while the first one rises, your filter is working: you cancel before shipping instead of paying a round trip.
These two numbers sit alongside the four indicators of the COD guide, and are read together with your return rate. Among UpConfirm merchants, confirmation plus verification before shipping brings 87 % of confirmed orders to the customer. The rest is delivery hazards — another job, another guide.