Order and Shipment Tracking Notifications History
Overview
The Notifications History dashboard in AfterShip Tracking provides a comprehensive and auditable log of the progress of each shipment and order notification. This enables teams to troubleshoot issues, confirm deliveries for customers, and assess the effectiveness of their communication.
- The dashboard offers a centralized view of the historical notifications, their triggers, send date, delivery status, tracking/order number associated, and the recipient email address. The history also includes all automated, manual, and test emails/SMS sent from your organization.
- The notifications data can be narrowed down based on your specific needs by applying filters like delivery status, triggers, and the time range for focused analysis.
- The historical notifications data can be exported into a CSV for offline auditing.
- You can view and export the list of recipients who have unsubscribed from receiving your email and SMS notifications. You can choose how far back you want the data for by applying the desired time range.
For export files:
a. A maximum of 1,000,000 rows can be exported. Any rows over this limit will be excluded.
b. Data will be exported based on the filters applied and will be sent to the registered email ID.
How to access the notifications history tab
- Go to Notifications, and select History in your AfterShip Tracking admin.
- The dashboard will open to the All tab, showcasing the notifications data of the last 30 days by default.
- You can switch between tabs to access notifications history by a particular notification type– Email, SMS, WhatsApp, and Facebook.
- Change the time range and set it to your preferred range from the current day up to 120 days.
- You can also filter notification history by Notifications trigger and status.
Notifications status
The Notifications Statuses provides an overview of the different stages and outcomes for notifications sent via various channels such as Email, SMS, WhatsApp, and Webhook. Each status represents a specific point in the notification's lifecycle, from creation and queuing to delivery, user interaction, or failure. This helps you monitor the progress and effectiveness of the notifications, troubleshoot issues, and understand recipient engagement across channels.
Channel | Notification status | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
Created | The request to send the notification has been successfully received and recorded by the system. | |
Queued | The notification is waiting in a line to be processed and sent. This happens during high-volume periods. | |
Dropped | The system intentionally did not send the email, often because the recipient is on a suppression list (e.g., unsubscribed, previously bounced) of the email processor. | |
Delivered | The email has been successfully received by the recipient's email server. | |
Failed | The email could not be delivered after multiple attempts (including temporary deferrals). This is considered a permanent failure for this specific message. | |
Bounced | The recipient's email server rejected the email. | |
Opened | The recipient has opened the email. | |
Clicked | The recipient has clicked on a link within the email. | |
Canceled | The notification was canceled by AfterShip. | |
SMS | Created | The request to send the notification has been successfully received and recorded by the system. |
SMS | Queued | The notification is waiting in a line to be processed and sent. |
SMS | Sent | The message has been successfully sent from our system to the mobile carrier's network. |
SMS | Delivered | The mobile carrier has confirmed the message was delivered to the recipient's device. |
SMS | Failed | The message could not be delivered. This could be due to an invalid number, a device being turned off, or other carrier-related issues. |
SMS | Canceled | The notification was canceled by AfterShip. |
Created | The request to send the notification has been successfully received and recorded by the system. | |
Queued | The notification is waiting in a line to be processed and sent to WhatsApp's servers. | |
Sent | The message has been successfully sent from our system to the WhatsApp network. | |
Delivered | WhatsApp has confirmed the message was delivered to the recipient's device. | |
Read | The recipient has read the message in WhatsApp. (This depends on the recipient's privacy settings.) | |
Failed | The message could not be delivered, often because the user has opted out of communications or the number is not on WhatsApp. | |
Webhook | Queued | The webhook call is waiting in a line to be sent to the destination URL. |
Webhook | Delivered | The destination server successfully received the webhook and responded with a success code (e.g., 200 OK). |
Webhook | Exception | The webhook was sent, but the receiving server responded with an error or timed out, indicating a problem on the destination's end. |
Email and SMS cancellation
This section explains why certain Email or SMS notifications were canceled before being sent. Cancellations occur due to factors such as recipient preferences, message content issues, system limitations, or previous message failures. These cancellations are tracked separately and will appear in the notification history only if they were explicitly canceled (not just filtered out by flow rules).
Email and SMS cancellation reasons
Canceled reason | Explanation |
Recipient unsubscribed from emails/SMS | The recipient has opted out of receiving further messages. |
Email hard bounced | A previous email to this address resulted in a hard bounce (permanent failure). |
Email soft bounced | A previous email to this address resulted in a soft bounce (temporary failure). |
Email marked as spam | The recipient reported the email as spam. |
SMS bounced | The mobile carrier reported a permanent failure (e.g., the number is a landline). |
Email address/Phone number format invalid | The provided contact information is incorrectly formatted. |
Phone number can’t receive SMS | The number is valid, but cannot receive SMS (e.g., landline detected before sending). |
Sender email/Sender number unavailable | The configured sender identity (email or number) is not available. |
SMS quota insufficient | The SMS subscription does not have enough quota remaining. |
Email/SMS content under review or not approved | The content is pending approval or was rejected due to policy or compliance checks. |
Email/SMS was blocked | The message was blocked by AfterShip’s internal risk control system. |
Unknown or unclassified reason | The cancellation occurred for an unspecified or uncategorized reason. |
Tip: Check the specific canceled reason in the notification history to resolve issues effectively.
Review email and SMS cancellation details
- Notification history dashboard: Every cancelled email and SMS notification will have a tooltip explaining the reason behind the cancellation, along with the Canceled label.
- Notification history details: Click on the Canceled label to open a popup with the complete details of the notification, including the recipient’s email address, the date when the notification was created, the reason why the notification was canceled, and the shipment details.
Email bounce reasons
An email bounce occurs when a message is rejected by the recipient’s mail server. High bounce rates can harm your overall email deliverability.
Bounces are categorized into two types:
- Hard bounce: A permanent failure due to which an email cannot be delivered.
- Soft bounce: A temporary issue preventing delivery of an email.
Email bounce reasons
Bounce Reason | Explanation |
|---|---|
Invalid Address | The recipient's email address is syntactically incorrect, or the recipient's mailbox does not exist. |
Technical Failure | A technical problem with the sender or with the mailbox provider, like: |
| a. The sender has missing or misconfigured DNS records. |
| b. The sender is failing authentication. |
| c. Temporary DNS or network failures. |
| d. Terminated connection between sender and receiver. |
| e. Service outages at the mailbox provider. |
Content Issue | The mailbox provider believes the content of your messages is potentially spam, malicious, or otherwise untrustworthy, like: |
| a. Suspicious links or URLs within the content. |
| b. Message content is too large. |
| c. Attachment too large, no attachments allowed, or invalid attachment type. |
| d. Text-to-image ratio. |
| e. Spam or malicious content. |
Reputation | The mailbox provider detects reputation issues with your sending domain or sending IP. |
High Frequency/Volume | The mailbox provider is unable or unwilling to process the number of messages you are trying to send. |
Mailbox Unavailable | The recipient mail server is unable to deliver the email due to a problem with an individual recipient's mailbox. These rejections do not indicate that the address you tried to reach was invalid. It simply means that the specific mailbox is currently unavailable or not accepting messages, like: |
| a. A mailbox can be full. |
| b. A mailbox can be deactivated. |
| c. A mailbox can be temporarily suspended by the mailbox provider. |
Unclassified | Other unclassified reason. |
Review email bounce details
- Notification history dashboard: Every bounced email will have a tooltip explaining the type and reason behind the bounce, along with the Bounced label.
- Notification history details: Click on the Bounced label to open a popup with the complete details of the notification, including the recipient’s email address, the date when the notification was created, the reason why the notification was bounced, and the shipment details.
Key takeaways
- The Notifications History dashboard offers a centralized, filterable, and exportable log of all notification activity to track communication performance and troubleshoot issues.
- Users can access and filter notifications history by type, date range (up to 120 days), trigger, and status from the AfterShip Tracking admin panel.
- Each notification, Email, SMS, WhatsApp, Webhook has detailed lifecycle statuses to help monitor delivery progress and user engagement.
- Canceled notifications are logged with clear reasons, helping teams diagnose delivery issues and optimize communication.
- Email bounces, both hard and soft are classified with detailed causes like invalid addresses, technical failures, or content issues, and lead to recipient suppression.
Updated on: 05/09/2025