Deposits let you collect a partial payment when a customer books, then invoice the remaining balance later. This is useful for high-value services where you want commitment upfront without requiring full payment at the time of booking.
Deposits are available on the Pro Plus plan and above. If you're on a lower plan, upgrade your plan to access this feature.
How deposits work
When a customer books a service with deposits enabled:
- The customer sees the deposit amount reflected as a discount at checkout — they only pay the deposit portion.
- A Shopify order is created for the deposit amount.
- After the appointment, you send an invoice for the remaining balance from the booking details screen.
- The customer pays the remaining balance through Shopify.
Both transactions (the deposit and the remaining balance) are linked to the booking, so you can track the full payment status from one place.
Setting up deposits
- Open the Easy Appointment Booking dashboard and go to your service (event).
- Scroll down to the Payment Options section and make sure Pay to Book is enabled.
- Toggle on Take a Deposit Payment.
- Choose your deposit type:
- Percentage of the event/service price — enter a percentage (e.g. 50 for a 50% deposit)
- Fixed amount — enter a specific dollar amount in your store currency
- Enter a Deposit label (up to 20 characters). This label appears to customers during checkout — for example, "Deposit Fee" or "Booking Deposit."
- Save your service.
If you choose a fixed amount, make sure it is lower than the product price. If the deposit amount is equal to or greater than the price, the deposit discount will not apply at checkout.
What the customer sees
When a customer selects a time and proceeds to checkout, the deposit is applied as a discount on the Shopify checkout page. The customer pays only the deposit amount.
For example, if your service costs $200 and you've set a 50% deposit, the customer sees a $100 discount labelled with your deposit label, and pays $100 at checkout.
Shopify displays the deposit discount as "Total Savings" on the checkout page. Customizing this label requires Shopify Plus. On standard Shopify plans, customers will see the default "Total Savings" text.
Collecting the remaining balance
After the appointment is complete, you can invoice the customer for the remaining balance directly from the app.
- Go to Bookings in the app dashboard.
- Find and open the booking.
- In the booking details, you'll see the deposit status and two options:
- Send invoice — creates a Shopify draft order for the remaining balance and emails the invoice to the customer. The customer can pay online through the invoice link.
- Mark as Paid — use this if the customer has already paid the remaining balance through other means (cash, e-transfer, etc.). This updates the booking status without creating a Shopify order.
Resending an invoice
If a customer hasn't paid their invoice, you can send a new one. Open the booking details and click Send new invoice. This creates a fresh draft order and sends a new invoice email.
Tracking payment status
Each booking shows its deposit payment status:
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Invoice sent | A draft order has been created and the invoice emailed to the customer. A link to the draft order in Shopify Admin is shown. |
| Paid Remaining | The customer has paid the remaining balance through the Shopify invoice. Links to both the original order and the invoice order are shown. |
| Paid Remaining (Manual) | You marked the remaining balance as paid manually. |
To send invoices, your Shopify store must have email verification completed. If you haven't verified your store email, Shopify will not send the invoice to the customer.
Alternative approaches
If deposits aren't the right fit, there are a couple of other options:
- Product variants for deposit vs. full payment — create two variants on your Shopify product (e.g. "Full Payment – $200" and "Deposit Only – $100"). Customers choose which option they prefer when booking.
- Skip Checkout — make the service free and collect payment separately through your own invoicing or in-person payment process.
Limitations
- Deposits are not supported for Point of Sale (POS) bookings. POS bookings collect payment through Shopify POS at the time of the in-person sale.
- The app does not automatically reconcile deposit and remaining-balance transactions — both are managed as separate Shopify orders.
- Deposit invoices are sent through Shopify's draft order system. The customer receives a standard Shopify invoice email, not a custom email from the app.
Next steps
- Sync to Shopify Orders — understand how bookings map to Shopify orders
- Plans and Pricing — see which features are included on each plan
- Admin Bookings — create and manage bookings from your dashboard