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Guides · Updated 2026-10-19

How to send Shopify B2B invoices and receipts to accounts payable (not just the buyer)

On Shopify B2B, the person who places the order is rarely the person who pays for it. The buyer gets Shopify's order confirmation; accounts payable and the company's accountant get nothing, so they email you asking for the invoice, and again for the receipt once it's paid. This guide covers what Shopify can and can't do here, the manual workarounds, and how to send invoices and receipts to the right people automatically.

Short answer: Shopify sends the order confirmation only to the customer who placed the order, and it can't be copied to other addresses. Shopify Flow can't send a receipt for a paid order either. You can download invoices by hand from an app like Order Printer and forward them, or store the accounts-payable address on the B2B company and let an automation email an invoice when an order on payment terms is placed and a receipt when it's paid.

Why this is a B2B problem

  • The buyer isn't the payer. A purchasing manager or a store employee places the order; finance pays it, often from a different inbox or system.
  • Net terms need a document. On Net 30 the customer needs an invoice with the due date and their PO number to schedule payment. Without it, the payment clock effectively starts when they finally get the invoice.
  • Branches. One company can have several locations, each with its own accounts team.

Merchants raise this on the Shopify Community regularly. A thread from December 2025 sums it up in its title: "Send a Receipt – How is this so hard for a B2B platform".

Option 1: Forward invoices by hand

Install an invoice app such as Shopify's Order Printer, open each order, download or print the invoice and email it to the customer's accounts team. Then do it again with a receipt when the order is paid. It works for a handful of orders a month and costs nothing, but it's the first job to slip on a busy week, and it depends on someone remembering who wants what.

Option 2: Make the accounts team a company contact

You can add the accounts-payable person as a second contact on the B2B company and give them a role that can view the location's orders (Location admin), so they can look orders up in their customer account. It doesn't email them anything when an order is placed by someone else, so they still have to remember to check.

Option 3: Send invoices and receipts automatically

This is what our n8n template does:

  1. Store the extra addresses on the company (or on a location, for branches) in a metafield, for example custom.receipt_emails, as a list of email addresses. Put them on the customer instead if you don't use B2B companies.
  2. When an order on payment terms is placed, email an invoice: company and location, PO number, terms, due date, items, amount due and how to pay. Skip orders that are already paid.
  3. When the order is paid (card, bank transfer marked as paid, or partial payments completing it), email a receipt with the amount paid.
  4. Attach a PDF. Many accounts teams forward invoices into their bookkeeping system, which wants a file, not an email body.
  5. Leave the buyer out by default. They already get Shopify's confirmation.
  6. Log every document (time, order, company, who it went to) so you can answer "did you send it?" in seconds.
Demo: the accounts-payable address on the company, the invoice with due date and PDF, the receipt and the Google Sheets log. The video loads from YouTube when you press play.

Which one should you use?

Forward by hand Extra company contact Automatic (n8n)
Cost Free Free Free version; Pro $29 once
Accounts payable gets the invoice When someone remembers Only if they log in Automatically, with due date
Receipt when paid By hand Only if they log in Automatically
PDF attached Yes No Pro
Different addresses per branch By hand Per contact Per company location
Record of what was sent Your sent folder No Google Sheets (Pro)

FAQ

Can Shopify copy the order confirmation to another email address? Not to a customer's second address. The order confirmation goes to the customer who placed the order. You can add staff notification recipients, but those are for your team, not your customer's accounts department.

Can Shopify Flow send a receipt to accounts payable? Flow can send internal emails to your staff, and B2B stores can send invoices for draft orders, but there's no Flow action that emails a receipt for a paid order to an address you choose.

Where should I store the accounts-payable address? On the B2B company, in a metafield that holds a list of emails. If branches pay their own invoices, put it on the company location instead, which takes priority. Tagged wholesale customers without B2B can have it on the customer.

Do invoices need to be PDFs? Not always, but most accounts teams prefer one: it's what they file and what their bookkeeping software imports. An email with the same details is fine for smaller customers.

Skip the setup

The B2B Receipts and Invoices Pro n8n template sends invoices on payment terms and receipts when paid, with a PDF and a Google Sheets log, for $29 once. Receipts only? The free version does that. Or have it installed and adapted for your store.

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