When guests subscribe and create an invoice without entering an email address, then a huge number of PENDING invoices are created. In order to delete an invoice there is this warning created that says it is recommended to cancel then delete the invoice which requires two steps to delete. 

It would be nice to to have a choice to do both steps in one click. Also, there is no way to cancel/delete multiple pending guest invoices which would save a HUGE amount of time canceling/deleting these useless pending invoices with no email address or information since these guests simply spend the time to create a useless invoice that clogs the subscription invoices with hundreds of useless invoices. Is there a work around anyone can figure out that would stop guests from doing this? Would appreciate any help. 

Do you want guests to be able to purchase these items at all? Or are these items that are only for existing members?

We are only using subscriptions for guests/inactive members. It is so tedious to first CANCEL a guest invoice with no email address or contact info, payment method, etc. They are blank invoices that simply say 'guest' 

It would be nice to have a tick button for the entire list of a page of invoices to CANCEL and DELETE both at the same time. I sure hope you build that into version 5. 

Now I have to cancel and delete pages of these blank invoices that clog the legitimate invoices of PAID subscriptions. 

At present you would, yes. I was asking in case I could prevent them from happening more for you

Just to be clear and redundant, let me explain how many of these bogus invoices are created by 'guests' (who knows why they are compelled to do this?) since December 10, 2024 (30 days since I last deleted all the bogus invoices, so it is now time to unclog this mess). Let me show you what happens according to the instructions I get. 

This is a screenshot of all the PENDING invoices (203 invoices):

So let's take the first invoice on the list, invoice #2351 and open it. this is what I see:

If I click on DELETE an individual invoice I get this warning message:

That's a scary message. Does it mean if I delete the invoice there is still some record of it somewhere else? I haven't a clue. Is it absolutely necessary to cancel the invoice before deleting it?  If not, then, why this scary message that it is so important to cancel the invoice? So then, if I click on CANCEL the invoice it then goes into the CANCELLED category which if you ciick on this button, I then see this:

Then if I open the invoice again or click on the far right down arrow (options) I can then DELETE the invoice. This is tedious. 

I again, request that we have a tick button at the top of the list of PENDING invoices so I can choose the entire page of 25 pending invoices and then cancel/delete the entire list on that page, and then go through the other eight pages and do the same. This would be less tedious. 

Or does anyone have an idea how to prevent these bogus invoices from being created by guests?

Just discovered EXPIRED invoices which I wasn't aware of and this is what I see (36 pages of bogus invoices): 

It is way too tedious to cancel/delete all these invoices. Need to improve this please. 

After investigating I looked under PAYMENT SETTINGS > CHECKOUT and clicked on the last two items requiring the guest to answer a question and to validate their email. Maybe this will stop all these bogus invoices?

Nevertheless, it would be an incredible improvement to simply be able to have a tick box that allows one to check all the bogus invoices guest create on a page so I can cancel/delete an entire page. 

We dont have that option as it would simply be dangerous to allow people to do this. It really needs to be a concious choice on each, or it could cause people many problems when making mistakes.

On 1/11/2025 at 12:30 PM, bradybarrows said:

That's a scary message. Does it mean if I delete the invoice there is still some record of it somewhere else? I haven't a clue. Is it absolutely necessary to cancel the invoice before deleting it?  If not, then, why this scary message that it is so important to cancel the invoice? So then, if I click on CANCEL the invoice it then goes into the CANCELLED category which if you ciick on this button, I then see this:

So it may be that you need to have items actioned, so should be cancelling first. In your case, likely not. For example, It maybe that you need to cancel subscriptions, ensure it removes someones access etc. So its warning you to ensure you do the correct action for you

23 hours ago, Marc said:

We dont have that option as it would simply be dangerous to allow people to do this. It really needs to be a concious choice on each, or it could cause people many problems when making mistakes.

So it may be that you need to have items actioned, so should be cancelling first. In your case, likely not. For example, It maybe that you need to cancel subscriptions, ensure it removes someones access etc. So its warning you to ensure you do the correct action for you

Marc, 
I sure don't want 'people' to do this. All I am asking is in the admin CP when I go and view the list of PENDING invoices, there are many pages of 'guests' who for some reason are making an invoice to a subscription and will not enter an email address or subscribe, but simply make a blank invoice. All I am requesting is the ability for an administrator to be able to choose these 'guest' invoices that are blank on a page by ticking a check box in the list individually or a check box  'all' the invoices on a given page so an admin can delete all these invoices rather than having to do this one at a time which is tedious. These blank invoices clog the list of legitimate paid subscription invoices. If you want you can log into my CP and view for yourself the many pages of these bogus blank invoices. 

I don't see how this would be 'dangerous' to an admin. I don't see how that would create a problem to the guests who create these bogus blank invoices. 

23 hours ago, Marc said:

We dont have that option as it would simply be dangerous to allow people to do this. It really needs to be a concious choice on each, or it could cause people many problems when making mistakes.

To add some context: It’s actually a foundational issue in the way Commerce is set up. It creates an invoice not when a purchase is made, but already when a product is added to the cart, which for most sites (allowing guest access), is something that even search engine crawlers are initiating by repeatedly following all links. As a result, Invision Community installations can be flooded with empty invoices in the ACP, which are then kept forever. They can be ignored, but they are still annoying, creating huge database tables for no reason and making  the ACP overview of invoices hard to browse. 

So, this really needs a proper solution at some point as it has existed at least throughout the entire 4.x product line.

Bradybarrows tries to fix the symptoms instead of curing the illness by trying to delete the invoices in an easier way. But the problem should not even occur to begin with or – if a major refactoring regarding the invoice creation isn’t feasible – should have an automatic solution. There would be nothing wrong with having prune options for these types of empty guest invoices. 

13 hours ago, opentype said:

To add some context: It’s actually a foundational issue in the way Commerce is set up. It creates an invoice not when a purchase is made, but already when a product is added to the cart, which for most sites (allowing guest access), is something that even search engine crawlers are initiating by repeatedly following all links. As a result, Invision Community installations can be flooded with empty invoices in the ACP, which are then kept forever. They can be ignored, but they are still annoying, creating huge database tables for no reason and making  the ACP overview of invoices hard to browse. 

So, this really needs a proper solution at some point as it has existed at least throughout the entire 4.x product line.

Bradybarrows tries to fix the symptoms instead of curing the illness by trying to delete the invoices in an easier way. But the problem should not even occur to begin with or – if a major refactoring regarding the invoice creation isn’t feasible – should have an automatic solution. There would be nothing wrong with having prune options for these types of empty guest invoices. 

Thanks for you insight into all this. Sure hope in an update they fix this. Apparently I am the lone requester for this feature update. 

On 1/14/2025 at 10:51 AM, opentype said:

To add some context: It’s actually a foundational issue in the way Commerce is set up. It creates an invoice not when a purchase is made, but already when a product is added to the cart, which for most sites (allowing guest access), is something that even search engine crawlers are initiating by repeatedly following all links. As a result, Invision Community installations can be flooded with empty invoices in the ACP, which are then kept forever. They can be ignored, but they are still annoying, creating huge database tables for no reason and making  the ACP overview of invoices hard to browse. 

So, this really needs a proper solution at some point as it has existed at least throughout the entire 4.x product line.

Bradybarrows tries to fix the symptoms instead of curing the illness by trying to delete the invoices in an easier way. But the problem should not even occur to begin with or – if a major refactoring regarding the invoice creation isn’t feasible – should have an automatic solution. There would be nothing wrong with having prune options for these types of empty guest invoices. 

^This

I have been trying to get this behaviour changed for years.

I really wish an invoice was created after a purchase was made, and not beforehand as it is now. It's an annoyance to the people who have to constantly go through these 'invoices' to weed out real ones and ones created just in case they change their mind.

I only want an invoice created when someone actually makes a purchase, and not beforehand. This is the only commerce package that I have used that has this behaviour.

Honestly, no disrespect to you guys, but this is one of many 'quality of life' changes I want with this application.

 

15 hours ago, bradybarrows said:

Thanks for you insight into all this. Sure hope in an update they fix this. Apparently I am the lone requester for this feature update. 

No, you're not. 😔