How Othermile checks an order before it ships
Every order can go out by more than one route, each with its own cost, border charge and delivery time. What Othermile looks at, how your limits decide, and what happens when an order needs you.
By the Othermile team
Every order your store receives can go out by more than one route: your printer's usual facility, a backup printer, mail or courier. Each route has a different cost, a different border charge and a different delivery time. Othermile looks at all of them for every order, before anything is printed or shipped, and does what your rules say.
1. The order arrives
Othermile connects to where your orders come from, such as Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Printify and Printful. A new order is checked as soon as it arrives. Customer names and street addresses are not kept.
2. Every route is priced
For each way the order could ship, Othermile works out what you pay (products, shipping and any border charges you prepay), what your customer may pay at the door, and what you keep. The products come from your own product list, with their tariff codes and origins.
3. Your limits decide
You set your limits once, for example: never let a customer pay more than C$15 at the door, and never let a margin drop below 30%. Each order then gets one of four outcomes:
- Released: inside your limits, so it goes ahead on its own.
- Switched: a better route is inside your limits, so it uses that one.
- Held: it needs you, so it waits and your phone shows every option side by side.
- Blocked: it cannot go, for example because the product is banned at the border.
4. You approve on your phone
A held order reaches your phone with each option priced. You choose one and confirm with Face ID, a fingerprint or your device lock. The approval covers only that choice.
5. A record of every decision
Each decision is kept in a signed record with what was known at the time, so you can show later why an order went the way it did.
Try it on your own store
Othermile is free during the beta. Create your account, connect a store, and your next order is checked before it ships. The integrations page lists everything that connects today.
This guide explains public rules in plain language for general information. It is not customs, tax or legal advice; the exact tariff code, your paperwork and the carrier decide the final amount.
Keep reading
What your Canadian customers pay at the door, and why
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Shipping from Canada to the US now that small parcels pay duty
Since August 29, 2025, parcels worth US$800 or less no longer enter the US without duty. What changed for Canadian sellers, how CUSMA helps, and what to do about it.
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A shirt sewn in Honduras and printed in North Carolina is usually still a Honduran shirt at the border. Why origin decides duty, CUSMA and tariffs, and where to find it for your products.