Troubleshooting

Troubleshooting Tips¶

Please ensure that you have updated to the latest version of the Zapier Integration for WooCommerce plugin.

Initial Setup¶

If you have issues during the initial set up of a Zap in Zapier, please refer to the Authentication Errors chapter below, or Zapier’s Troubleshooting documentation.

Once You’re Up and Running¶

Your WordPress dashboard Zapier.com

Once your initial setup and configuration are completed and your Zapier integrations for WooCommerce are running, most of the time, if a problem occurs, it will be shown in your WordPress Dashboard’s Task History screen or in the Zapier.com Task History screen.

If you experience stopped or halted tasks, please view the task details to decide what to do next. For further information, see the Task History chapter.

If it is an error, you can usually find the related information in your WordPress Dashboard’s Task History screen. From there you can navigate to the actual Resource and inspect its WooCommerce Zapier History box, or you can review the Logs in your WordPress dashboard.

Issues with Zaps¶

If you are having other problems with a Zap that you have created, we recommend contacting Zapier Support. They are usually the best people to help you with any issues that you have within the Zapier dashboard, Zap configuration and/or behaviour.

General WooCommerce Issues¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If you encounter errors or issues in WooCommerce, first visit the WooCommerce Status Screen to identify and troubleshoot errors, or look at the Logs.

If you need further support, please don’t hesitate to Contact Us and send a support request.

Enabling Detailed Logging¶

Your WordPress dashboard

To help troubleshoot and identify the exact cause of an issue, our support team may ask you to do the following:

1. Please go to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Settings screen → Zapier tab, and then tick the Enable Detailed Logging checkbox and Save changes.

This allows our support team to see detailed information about your store, and will usually help us resolve an issue.

Install or Update Issues¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If you are having problems installing or updating the Zapier Integration for WooCommerce plugin to the latest version via your WordPress Dashboard, please follow these steps:

1. Go to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Extensions → My Subscriptions screen and verify that your WooCommerce.com account is connected and your Zapier Integration for WooCommerce license is active.
2. On your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Extensions → My Subscriptions screen, click the Refresh button to force a refresh of your account data from WooCommerce.com.
3. Go to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → Updates screen, and click the Check Again button to force WordPress to check for updates again.
4. The Zapier Integration for WooCommerce plugin update should now show on the Updates screen. Select it and click Update Plugins to install the update.
5. If you still encounter problems, disconnect and reconnect your WooCommerce.com account. To do this, go back to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Extensions → My Subscriptions screen, hover over your user avatar (top right of screen) and click Disconnect account. Click Connect and follow the prompts, then retry steps 2-4 above.
6. If you still encounter problems, please submit a ticket here and choose the Manage my WooCommerce.com account option so that the WooCommerce Support Team can assist.

Authentication Issues¶

Below are some common errors and issues that can occur when you are Authenticating via the Zapier.com Zap Editor interface.

Authentication Dialog¶

Zapier.com

When you create your first WooCommerce Zap, you will be asked to choose your WooCommerce account.

The authentication process involves the Zapier.com service connecting to your WooCommerce store using your WordPress administrator username and password.

Please ensure you complete the authentication dialog window correctly:

• In the WordPress Site Address (URL) field, enter the URL to your WordPress website’s home (front) page. Be sure the URL starts with https:// and does not include the trailing slash.
  For example: https://example.com
  If in doubt, go to the WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → Settings → General screen and copy the Site Address (URL) field value and paste it into the WordPress Site Address (URL) field in the authentication dialog window.
• In the WordPress Username field, enter your administrator username or email address that you use when logging into the WordPress dashboard.

• In the WordPress Application Password field, create an Application Password for your WordPress administrator account.

  Use a WordPress Application Password for isolation and better compatibility

  Using an application password (rather than your regular password) improves compatibility with security-related plugins and services. Also keeps user and service related access separated. See details in the Security Plugins chapter.

  To set up an Application Password, go to WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → Users → Profile screen and press the “Add New Application Password” button. Please see here for details.

  Can’t see the Application Passwords settings in WordPress? Please see here for suggestions.

  Alternatively, you can use your regular WordPress password.

Click the Yes, Continue to WooCommerce button to complete the process.

Authentication Errors¶

Zapier.com

If you encounter an error whilst authenticating, please make a note of the red error message that you see in the Zapier Authentication popup window, and click on the error message below for the next steps.

If you continue to encounter an authentication or communication error, and you are sure your username and password are correct, then it is likely you have a security-related service or plugin on your website that is preventing Zapier from authenticating with your WooCommerce store. See the Compatibility Issues chapter for more details. If the above suggestions do not resolve your issue, please contact support for further assistance.

Using Detailed Logging to Determine the Reason for an Authentication Failure¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If you still are unable to identify the cause of your authentication issues, please try the following:

1. Ensure that you have the latest version of Zapier Integration for WooCommerce plugin installed.
   You will need to be running version 2.0.2 or newer to complete the following steps.
2. Enable detailed logging by going to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Settings screen → Zapier tab, and then tick the Enable Detailed Logging checkbox and Save changes.
3. Return the to Zap Editor on Zapier.com, and try and re-authenticate.
4. The authentication attempt will likely fail again, however, this time a detailed reason why it failed will be recorded in your WooCommerce logs.
5. Go to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Status screen → Logs tab and select the newest log whose name starts with woocommerce-zapier. Press the View button.
6. The log should contain an Authentication attempt failed or Authentication validation failed message, along with a detailed reason that should help you determine the problem.

If you solved the issue, that’s great!

If you’re not able to solve the issue yourself, please contact support and be sure to include the red error message from step 3 and the logged error message from step 6.

You can disable detailed logging once you have finished troubleshooting.

Compatibility Issues¶

Network-connected devices, configurations or other software can interfere and cause problems with the communication between your store and Zapier.com. Including but not limited are CDNs, Load Balancers, firewalls, or server software, hosting providers or specific configurations.

Ensure you are utilising the Application Password feature for maximum compatibility.

Please see the following resources for possible compatibility issues.

• Hosting Providers
• Incompatible Plugins
• Security Plugins
• Two-Factor Authentication

Issues with Tasks¶

Errored Tasks¶

Zapier.com

Task errors can occur for a wide variety of reasons, but you can always see the exact reason when you open your task history and look at the error message. Here is an example of a task error:

Click on the relevant error message below to see the most common errors related to the Zapier Integration for WooCommerce plugin and the possible solutions.

Halted Tasks¶

Zapier.com

Most of the time when a Zapier task is halted, this is the expected behaviour. For example, if you use a Filter by Zapier step] and the incoming data does not match what your filter criteria.

Another common reason why a task is halted is that WooCommerce cannot perform the specific task on the Resource. Every halted task has a detailed reason that you can refer to on the task details page.

For example for the latter, the task will be halted if you are trying to create a new coupon with a coupon code that already exists:

There are many possible reasons why a Zapier task can’t be completed. The Zapier Integration for WooCommerce plugin handles these cases for you to prevent introducing a problem in WooCommerce and always provides a detailed explanation on the task details page.

Resource Sent with Wrong Status¶

Your WordPress dashboard

Zapier Integration for WooCommerce uses Action Scheduler, which is a WooCommerce core feature that needs to be working correctly for the extension to send data to Zapier.

This means that data is not sent immediately to Zapier. Instead, the data is queued to be sent asynchronously in the background.

This helps ensure that your customers don’t experience a slow checkout process. It also allows the extension to send the data if there is an error communicating with Zapier.

A typical delay is between ten seconds and one minute, but the delay can be much longer in a staging/testing/development environment or sites with extremely low traffic.

If a Resource status changes during scheduling and sending to Zapier, WooCommerce will send the Resource with the new status information to Zapier. Furthermore, if you are using the Order status changed (any status) or the Subscription status changed (any status) trigger rules, in this case, Zapier will receive the same data multiple times.

There is an automatic de-duplication implemented in the Zapier platform, to prevent fire multiple tasks. Please Contact Us if you are experiencing the above problem.

Data not Sending or Delayed¶

Webhook Issues¶

Zapier Integration for WooCommerce uses WooCommerce’s built-in webhook mechanism to send data to Zapier.

Webhook Missing or Disabled¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If WooCommerce encounters an error when sending data to Zapier, it will automatically disable the webhook, which stops future data from being sent to that Zap.

Please go to the WooCommerce Webhooks screen, and look for any disabled WooCommerce Zapier webhooks. If you find any, please edit each one and change them to active so the new data can be sent to Zapier.

If a Zapier webhook is missing or has been accidentally deleted, please go to Zapier.com and turn your WooCommerce Zap(s) off and on again, which will recreate the webhook in WooCommerce.

Webhook Payload Issues¶

Aug 2023

WooCommerce’s webhooks are created automatically by Zapier Integration for WooCommerce, and they are tied to the WordPress user that created them.

If that WordPress user account is deleted, the webhook(s) assigned to that user will stop working.

Similarly, if the WordPress user is still present but their permissions have changed (for example, being changed from an Administrator to a Contributor), the webhook(s) will also stop working.

Both of these cases will result in:

• Zapier Tasks stopped with the following error message: Sorry, you cannot view this resource. Error code: woocommerce_rest_cannot_view on https://example.com.
• An Unexpected WP_Error payload for Webhook error message being logged in the Zapier Integration for WooCommerce Logs.

Follow these steps to resolve the problem:

1. Visit the Zapier website to view your WooCommerce app’s connections.
2. Click on the 3 dots next to your connection(s), then click Reconnect.
3. Follow the prompts to reauthenticate your WooCommerce.com account. See our Zapier Authentication documentation for more information on how to authenticate.
4. Repeat the above steps for each WooCommerce connection that you have listed.
5. Once you have re-authenticated, go to the WooCommerce Zaps screen and turn each of your WooCommerce Zap(s) off and on again. This will recreate each webhook in WooCommerce.
6. (Optional) You can send any missing data retrospectively. The above error logs will list each Resource ID (such as an Order ID or Product ID) so you know which records to transfer.

If you have a different ERROR message logged or displaying in your Zapier Task History, please Contact Us for further assistance, and include a full copy of your Zapier Integration for WooCommerce Logs.

Action Scheduler¶

Your WordPress dashboard

Zapier Integration for WooCommerce uses Action Scheduler, which is a WooCommerce core feature that needs to be working correctly for the extension to send data to Zapier.

This means that data is not sent immediately to Zapier. Instead, the data is queued to be sent asynchronously in the background.

This helps ensure that your customers don’t experience a slow checkout process. It also allows the extension to send the data if there is an error communicating with Zapier.

A typical delay is between ten seconds and one minute, but the delay can be much longer in a staging/testing/development environment or sites with extremely low traffic.

The WooCommerce Action Scheduler facility uses WordPress’ built-in Cron for scheduling. This means it will only work correctly if your WordPress Cron is working correctly and subsequently Zapier Integration for WooCommerce’s ability to send data to Zapier.

Action Scheduler has a dedicated website. Also, you can find further information in this article on how to troubleshoot the Action Scheduler queue or WordPress Cron execution issues.

Pending Tasks¶

On the Action Scheduler screen, you can check the Pending tasks by clicking on the Pending filter.

Look for tasks with a hook name of woocommerce_deliver_webhook_async. If you have one or more, it means that queued trigger data hasn’t been sent yet.

You can manually run Pending tasks from that screen, but if tasks remain pending, you will need to identify why the Action Scheduler queue isn’t automatically processing tasks. Usually, the origin of the problem is a malfunction in the WordPress Cron system. See the WordPress Cron chapter for more details.

If the problem persists, go to your Logs screen and look for any errors in the recent logs, it may have information that helps identify the problem.

Failed Tasks¶

To check for Failed tasks, go to your Action Scheduler screen, then click on the Failed filter (if it doesn’t exist, you don’t have failed tasks).

There you can search for your Resource by ID (such as an Order ID or Product ID) to confirm if the Resource was sent to Zapier or not in the first place. Unfortunately, there is no option to resend a failed task. Please see the Transferring Existing Data Using a Zap chapter if you want to send previously failed data.

If the timeout is the reason, this often occurs when Action Scheduler has too many jobs, and the allowed time limit for PHP is not enough. (The default setting is 30 seconds.) To overcome this limitation, you need to modify the PHP max_execution_time settings in your hosting environment. If you can, please set it to at least 120 seconds.

You can tweak the Action Scheduler behaviour further with the Action Scheduler High Volume plugin.

The Action Scheduler High Volume plugin only works correctly if your max_execution_time PHP settings are at least 120 seconds.

If you have failed tasks or the Action Scheduler High Volume plugin can’t solve the issue, please Contact Us and copy the log column and include it when you send a support request.

WordPress Cron¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If your data is being sent to Zapier erratically, or if your data is being sent slowly or in a delayed fashion, you may have a problem with the WordPress Cron system. If your WordPress installation’s cron system isn’t working correctly, Zapier Integration for WooCommerce will not work correctly either.

The WP Crontrol plugin can help pinpoint cron issues. First, it tests the WordPress Cron spawner on your site and reports the error message if it fails. Also, you can check it manually by going to the WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → Tools → Cron Events screen and looking for the “Next Run” columns. If the dates are mostly in the past, especially multiple days or more, your WordPress Cron is not working as expected.

Alternate Cron¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If your Zaps are receiving an error message such as rest_api_unavailable or The Rest API is unavailable. when WooCommerce data is sent to Zapier, you may affect this known issue with WooCommerce core itself, which causes the rest_api_unavailable error to occur when delivering data via webhooks. This affects Zapier Integration for WooCommerce and any other services that rely on WooCommerce’s webhooks facility.

The problem only occurs when you use WordPress’ ALTERNATE_WP_CRON feature.

Until WooCommerce core fixes the issue in WooCommerce itself, it is necessary to disable ALTERNATE_WP_CRON on your site.

This WordPress article explains where this constant is defined. Therefore, removing that line from your wp-config.php file is necessary.

Server Cron Job¶

Your WordPress dashboard

This is the recommended approach for reliable and timely delivery of your WooCommerce data to Zapier.

If your server has WP-CLI installed, we suggest setting up a cron job that processes the Action Scheduler/WordPress Cron queue, for example:

cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp action-scheduler run

cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp cron event run --due-now

cd /path/to/wordpress/ && php wp-cron.php?doing_wp_cron

(where /path/to/WordPress/ is the path to your WordPress installation).

If your cron configuration is working as expected, you can disable WordPress’ default WP-Cron behaviour by adding the following line to the wp-config.php file:

define('DISABLE_WP_CRON', true);

Your web host can usually assist with setting up this cron job.

If you are interested, see here for more details on Action Scheduler WP-CLI commands. See here for the WP-CLI cron command.

cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp --url=example.com/au action-scheduler run
cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp --url=example.com/uk action-scheduler run
cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp --url=example.com/us action-scheduler run

cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp --url=example.com/au cron event run --due-now
cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp --url=example.com/uk cron event run --due-now
cd /path/to/wordpress/ && wp --url=example.com/us cron event run --due-now

Success: 2 scheduled tasks completed.

Success: Executed a total of 2 cron events.

Uptime Services¶

A less technical solution is to create a free Pingdom or UptimeRobot account and point it to your site’s WP-Cron endpoint. For example, https://example.com/wp-cron.php?doing_wp_cron.

This should make WordPress Cron fire regularly (from every 30 seconds using Pingdom to every 5 minutes using UptimeRobot).

- https://example.com/au/wp-cron.php?doing_wp_cron
- https://example.com/uk/wp-cron.php?doing_wp_cron
- https://example.com/us/wp-cron.php?doing_wp_cron

PayPal Payment Processor¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If you are using PayPal payments on your store, please ensure that PayPal Instant Payment Notification (IPN) is properly configured.

Please go to your WordPress Dashboard → Side Menu → WooCommerce → Settings screen → Payments tab and click on PayPal. Ensure that the Receiver Email setting is correct and matches your PayPal email address.

Alternatively, you can enable Payment Data Transfer (PDT) in your WooCommerce dashboard. The PayPal Standard documentation has a section about how to enable PDT.

REST API Issues¶

Your WordPress dashboard

The REST API is how Zapier communicates with your WooCommerce store to send and receive data, so your WooCommerce store’s REST API must be operational and working correctly.

We have listed some of the most common error messages that you may encounter when using Zapier Integration for WooCommerce with a WooCommerce store with REST API configuration issues:

• Authentication response parse failed.
• Authentication response is missing required information.
• Create Resource response parse failed
• Update Resource response parse failed
• Search Resource response parse failed
• List Resource response parse failed
• Hook Resource response parse failed
• WooCommerce returned "..."
• WooCommerce returned "There has been a critical error on this website. Learn more about troubleshooting WordPress."
• Webhook Subscribe response parse failed.
• Webhook Unsubscribe response parse failed.
• We’re having trouble loading ‘Trigger Rule’ data (WooCommerce returned “…”.)
• We’re having trouble loading ‘Trigger Rule’ data (This user does not have the correct permissions.)
• We’re having trouble loading ‘Trigger Rule’ data (WooCommerce returned “There has been a critical error on this website. Learn more about troubleshooting WordPress.”)
• Trigger Rule response parse failed.
• Input Fields response parse failed.

WooCommerce REST API¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If your WooCommerce REST API is not working correctly, please consult the Getting Started with the REST API guide for details on how to verify that your REST API is working correctly.

To connect Zapier, you don’t need to install an extra REST Auth plugin or manage REST API keys or Webhooks in your store. The integration automatically handles those for you.

Coming Soon or Maintenance Mode¶

Your WordPress dashboard

The most common cause is a simple one: your WooCommerce store isn’t publicly accessible because you have a “Coming Soon” or “Maintenance Mode” plugin active. Please try deactivating it, and ensure that people can view/visit your website without needing to log in to WordPress.

Invalid or Untrusted SSL Certificates¶

Your WordPress dashboard

Your website must also have a valid and trusted SSL certificate installed for Zapier to communicate with your WooCommerce store.

If you encounter an error message such as certificate verify failed, it usually means that the Zapier service isn’t able to successfully connect to your WooCommerce store because it uses an SSL certificate that was issued from a Certificate Authority that Zapier doesn’t trust.

Please consult this Zapier guide and this Zapier guide for further instructions, and if the problem persists please contact Zapier support for assistance.

Debug Output¶

Your WordPress dashboard

WordPress or PHP debug output can render REST API responses invalid, so make sure the WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY constant is set to false in your site’s wp-config.php file:

define( 'WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY', false );

Please see here for more details.

SSL Check Failing¶

Your WordPress dashboard

For the WooCommerce REST API authentication process to work correctly, your website must be configured to use SSL correctly.

If your status screen shows SSL as red (No), then you will be unable to authenticate your WooCommerce store with Zapier:

Often this issue results in one of the following error messages when you authenticate your WooCommerce store with Zapier:

• Sorry, your connection isn’t secure. Please use TLS (HTTPS) to continue.
• Sorry, you cannot list resources.

Also, if you review your Zapier Integration for WooCommerce logs, you will likely see the following error message:

CRITICAL: Authentication validation failed via ping. TLS (HTTPS) required.

To resolve this issue, you will need to contact your web host and let them know that WordPress core’s is_ssl() function is returning false during WooCommerce REST API requests, and ask them to resolve this for you. Often it is an indication that your website’s SSL/HTTPS configuration isn’t correct.

You can also go here and perform an SSL Server Test for your website. This test can often identify common SSL misconfigurations that may need to be fixed by your web hosting provider for Zapier Integration for WooCommerce to work correctly.

WooCommerce REST API Authentication¶

Your WordPress dashboard

If you are still receiving the Sorry, you cannot list resources. error message after trying the above steps, then this usually means that WooCommerce’s REST API is unable to authenticate using a standard consumer key and secret, which means that Zapier Integration for WooCommerce is unable to work as expected.

For Zapier Integration for WooCommerce to operate correctly, your website must have a working WooCommerce REST API. This is listed in our System Requirements.

You can check whether your WooCommerce REST API authentication mechanism is working by following this documentation which explains how to create a consumer key and secret, and then test if your REST API is working by querying the https://example.com/wp-json/wc/v3/orders?consumer_key=XXXX&consumer_secret=XXXX endpoint to confirm that it returns an HTTP 200 OK response and not an HTTP 401 Unauthorized response.

If the response is 401, then please review our list of known incompatible and conflicting plugins.

If you are still receiving a 401 response, please use a separate staging/test environment to temporarily switch to a default WordPress theme and deactivate all plugins (except WooCommerce), and then try authenticating to your test environment. If it works, then you can reactivate your plugins one by one to determine which one is causing the authentication problem.

If authentication still isn’t working with only the WooCommerce plugin active, then this indicates that WooCommerce core’s built-in REST API authentication isn’t working as it should. Please log into your WooCommerce.com account and submit a support request to the WooCommerce core support team so that they can investigate and identify why WooCommerce core’s REST API query parameter authentication mechanism isn’t working as expected.

Other Resources to Assist With REST API Issues¶

Your WordPress dashboard

Here are some other great resources that may also be helpful:

• Getting started with the WooCommerce REST API
• How to Fix Common WooCommerce REST API Issues

Zapier Service Outages¶

Zapier.com

From time to time, the Zapier.com service may have an outage or a period of downtime. This can cause delays or occasionally skipped or errored tasks. Please be patient, up until the issue is resolved by Zapier and do not attempt to resubmit data.

If all Zapier services are working normally, you can start collecting information on what data missing.

To identify which data you need to resubmit, first look at the Zapier Task History page, and search for any errors. You can replay a task from this page.

If you still have missing data, because they have not arrived at Zapier at all, you can resend them with specific triggers. For further reference see transferring data through an existing Zap chapter.

For the current Zapier service status information, please visit the Zapier Status page.