Cash on delivery

Confirming cash-on-delivery orders in Eastern Europe before the parcel leaves

Cash on delivery lets people buy from a shop they have never tried, and lets them say no at the door. A short check between the order and the courier is the cheapest place to catch a parcel that would come back. Here is what to confirm, how to ask, and what to do with the answers.

The RevOrder team Published 1 November 2026 7 min read

In short

A refused cash-on-delivery parcel usually costs shipping both ways and earns nothing, so catch doubtful orders before the waybill exists.
Confirm four things: intent, destination, a working phone number and the amount the courier will collect.
Send a message to most orders, and call when the message did not settle it.
A “no” or silence means review, not automatic cancellation. Judge the process by refused parcels, not by reply rates.

Why confirm before the parcel leaves

In Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, Hungary and their neighbours, paying the courier in cash is still an ordinary way to buy online, and every market has a word for it: наложен платеж in Bulgaria, ramburs in Romania, αντικαταβολή in Greece, utánvét in Hungary, pouzeće in Serbia and Croatia. Cash on delivery also lets the customer refuse the parcel, usually at no cost to them, while the store typically pays the courier both ways and waits days for the goods to come back.

Many refusals have causes you can see before dispatch: an impulse order regretted by the time the courier calls, the same product ordered from two shops, a wrong phone number or an address the courier cannot find, or a total higher than the customer remembered. Confirmation can catch many regretted and duplicate orders, and it gives you a chance to correct a wrong phone number or address and to clear up the total. It is no guarantee, though: some customers say yes and still refuse at the door. Late deliveries are a separate problem.

What to confirm

Confirm only what decides whether the parcel will be accepted:

Intent: the customer placed this order and still wants it. Duplicates surface here too.
Destination: the office or locker in the order or, for door delivery, a street address with a number and, where it matters, the building and entrance.
Phone: a message that reaches the customer shows that the courier can reach them too.
Total: the exact amount to collect, shipping and any cash-on-delivery fee included, so nothing surprises the customer at the door.

One message can cover all four: name the order, the total and where it is going, and ask for a one-word answer.

SMS reply or phone call

An SMS asking for a yes or a no costs little, does not interrupt, and leaves a written answer. It needs a sender number that can receive replies (an alphanumeric sender name cannot) and a system that matches each reply to its order. A call costs more and needs people available when customers pick up, but a person can answer questions and spot a duplicate.

In RevOrder the reply flow runs over SMS only, and today it is built for Bulgarian numbers. The ready-made question is in Bulgarian, written in Latin letters to fit one SMS, and only the first word of the reply counts: ДА or НЕ in either alphabet, or YES, NO, OK, 1 and 2. Romanian, Greek or Hungarian answers such as NU, ΟΧΙ or NEM are not recognised, so elsewhere plan on calls or a manual check. Any other reply stays in your SMS inbox without touching the order.

When to call instead of sending a message

Call when:

The SMS got no answer within the reply window (24 hours in RevOrder).
The customer said “no”, to learn whether it is a real cancellation, a duplicate or a change.
A refusal would be expensive: a high-value, bulky or made-to-order item.
It is a first order to a door address, or the address looks incomplete.

Do not call customers who already said yes. If you use both channels, make sure a yes takes the order out of the call queue.

In RevOrder an SMS yes changes the order status only if you choose the “Tag and status” option. Choose it and let the SMS work before the call center calls, or have the call center call only after a НЕ or no answer.

What to do with a “no” or with silence

A “no” is not always a cancellation: the customer may have answered the wrong message, ordered twice, or want a different size or address. Silence is even less of a verdict, because people miss messages. Cancel every unanswered order automatically and you lose real orders along with the doubtful ones.

So mark the order, call if it is worth a call, and then decide: ship it, ask for prepayment, hold it or cancel it. Leave the cancellation to a person, with the reason written down.

RevOrder works the same way: a НЕ never cancels the order but adds the tag “Declined by SMS” and a review note, and no answer after 24 hours adds “No SMS answer”. If the shop uses the call center, you can also have either one create a call task: the call after a НЕ and the call after no answer are separate settings, both off by default.

How confirmation connects to couriers and fulfilment

Confirmation pays off only when its result decides what ships. A simple daily rule: what is confirmed before the courier pickup goes out that day, and the rest waits or gets a call.

With a direct courier such as Econt or Speedy, your team creates the waybills, so it decides what leaves. In RevOrder you can filter orders by their confirmation tag and create waybills from the orders screen, one at a time or in a batch, with the amount to collect filled in.

If NextLevel handles your fulfilment, RevOrder sends orders there automatically when they are created; that is the default. When a RevOrder call center operator confirms an order, NextLevel is told by default, so the customer is not called twice; when the customer refuses on the call, the NextLevel order is cancelled if nothing has been done with it yet. The order in RevOrder and in your store is not cancelled automatically.

An SMS yes never creates a waybill on its own, RevOrder does not hold unconfirmed orders back from the courier automatically, and confirmation results are not written back to Shopify, WooCommerce or other store platforms.

How to tell whether it works

Reply rates say little on their own; refused parcels are what cost money. Track:

Refused or returned cash-on-delivery parcels as a share of those shipped, by week, courier and delivery type (door, office or locker).
The same refusal rate split by outcome: confirmed by reply, confirmed by call, declined, no answer and never asked.
Orders cancelled after review, with the reason. Duplicates or wrong addresses point to fixes in the checkout.
The cost of messages and calls per confirmed order, set against what a refused parcel costs you.

Customers who answer tend to be the ones who would have accepted the parcel anyway, so comparing confirmed with unconfirmed orders flatters the confirmation. A before-and-after comparison is fairer.

In RevOrder the dashboard shows confirmation, delivered, cancel and return rates based on order status, so an SMS yes counts there only if it changes the status. SMS answers are tags you can filter on the Orders page; the call center pages show dialled, picked-up and confirmed orders, the cost per confirmed order and call recordings. An AI assistant connected to RevOrder can read the same figures.

Where RevOrder fits

RevOrder covers confirmation in three parts. None of them is on by default:

An automation for new orders that are provably cash on delivery (card and prepaid orders never get it): an information SMS right after the order, or a ДА/НЕ question five minutes after it. Each order is asked once.
Reply handling: ДА adds the tag “Confirmed by SMS” and, if you choose, moves a new or pending order to “Confirmed”; НЕ and no answer are tagged for review.
A managed call center: operators from RevOrder's own desk or partner call centers, not your staff, call new and unconfirmed orders following the script you write. You can limit calls to cash-on-delivery orders, delay them, and let the SMS work first.

SMS is charged per SMS part (a long or Cyrillic text can take two or three) and call center work per handled order; the platform itself is free. See pricing for billing, order confirmation for the setup, and cash on delivery under control for who sees cash on delivery at checkout.

Questions about confirming cash-on-delivery orders

Should every cash-on-delivery order be confirmed?

Not necessarily. Start with a message for every cash-on-delivery order and a call where the message did not settle it, then adjust using your own refusal figures.

Does a “no” reply cancel the order in RevOrder?

No. It gets the tag “Declined by SMS” and waits for your review. If the shop uses the call center and you have switched on the call after a НЕ, it can also create a call task.

Can customers in Romania, Greece or Hungary confirm by replying to an SMS?

Not through RevOrder today: the reply flow is built for Bulgarian numbers and reads ДА/НЕ, YES/NO, OK, 1 and 2. Use calls there, and ask us which countries and languages the call center covers for your shop.

Does RevOrder hold unconfirmed orders back from the courier?

No. With a direct courier your team creates the waybills and can ship confirmed orders first. With NextLevel, orders reach the warehouse when they are created, and a refusal on a call cancels the order there only if it has not been processed yet.

Useful links

Econt — courier in Bulgaria: offices, lockers and cash-on-delivery terms
Speedy — courier in Bulgaria: offices and lockers
NextLevel — fulfilment and courier network

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