OPEN
The order form, and the point where cancelling stops being free
An order is not one event. It is four states, each with a published response window, and your room to change anything shrinks at every handover. This page walks the whole thing while it is all still editable.
Everything quoted here comes from pages OrientDig publishes itself. Dates and source links are under each section.
OPEN
Four ways an item reaches your OrientDig cart
Everything downstream runs from link to parcel through the same pipe, so the way an item gets into the cart matters less than people expect. There are four, and only the last one changes what you are responsible for.
The ordinary route is a paste. You copy the address of a seller listing and drop it into the link field, and the service reads the listing for you: title, options, price, seller.
Scroll the screenshot to inspect each field.
View full-size imageThe second route is a keyword search, which is the same pipe with a search step in front of it. The third is a card from a catalogue like the one on this site, which is a paste you did not have to do yourself. All three end with the listing already parsed, and that parsing is the part that protects you: the options you pick come from the seller page, not from your description of it.
The fourth route is the manual one, further down this page, and it is the one where that protection goes away.
LOCKS
The two fields that matter
Reading a listing for the things that lock
Judging a listing before you submit it costs nothing, and it is the last moment when it is free. Two fields on the order panel do almost all of the damage.
The first is the option set: size, colour, variant. Those come from the seller and they are what gets bought. The second is the message box, which is the only place your own words reach the people handling the order at all.
Scroll the screenshot to inspect each field.
View full-size imageThat placeholder is worth taking literally. The box is for special requirements about this order, not for conversation. Use it for anything a size chart cannot carry: a measurement in centimetres, a request to check a specific detail, a note that two items go together. OrientDig states that a size check at the warehouse follows whatever you wrote here, so an empty box means nothing gets measured.
The trade is worth knowing. The published service standard says a remark can extend processing time, because the agent has to wait for the seller to come back online and answer it. A useful note is worth the delay. A decorative one is not.
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The order states, and the window published for each one
These windows are OrientDig service standards, quoted from their own page and read on 2026-09-22. They describe what the agent commits to, not what a seller commits to, and the difference matters most in the last two states.
Bought from you, not yet from the seller
Orders received between 09:00 and 18:00 are handled within about six hours. Orders received outside those hours are handled by 14:00 the next day. Purchase follows within 24 hours of your confirmation.
This is the only state where cancelling is a button rather than a negotiation.
Cancel within 24 hours, refunded at the actual amountThe seller has your money now
The agent commits to checking with the seller within 48 hours. Domestic sellers are expected to dispatch in 3 to 7 days; if nothing moves, the first chase is on day 4 and then every 3 or 4 days after that.
If the seller turns out to be out of stock, you get asked what to do, and the order auto-cancels if you do not answer within 72 hours.
Seller contacted within 48 hours; 72 hours to reply on a stock problemMoving inside China, untouchable
Nothing about the goods can be changed here and nothing can be inspected. The agent commits to the same 48 hour response on anything you ask, but there is very little worth asking.
The useful move in this state is deciding what you want photographed when it lands, because that request is made at order time and not now.
Response within 48 hoursIn the warehouse, and the clock starts
Now you can see it, and now the return window is running. A return or exchange has to be applied for within 48 hours, inside a window of five days after the goods are stored, and it is settled under the seller after-sales rules rather than the agent policy.
One return or exchange a month is free; after that they are charged at 5 CNY each. A refund lands 4 to 10 days after the seller actually refunds.
Apply within 48 hours, inside 5 days of stock-inService standards quoted from the official page, read on 2026-09-22. Open the help centre.
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The fourth route, where the description becomes yours
If a listing is not on a platform the parser supports, there is a manual order form. You fill in the product details yourself, and that single change moves the responsibility for those details from the seller page onto you.
Scroll the screenshot to inspect each field.
View full-size imageThe form still wants the link. What changes is that nothing is read out of it for you: the name and the specifications are yours to type, and they are what gets bought.
Everything marked required has to be right, because nothing cross-checks it. If you type the wrong variant, the agent buys the wrong variant and has done exactly what you asked. There is no listing to appeal to afterwards.
Use this route when you have to, not when you are in a hurry. If the item exists on a supported platform, the parsed route is safer for the same money.
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Seven things submission counts as agreeing to
These are published as conditions of placing an order, not as small print discovered later. Read them once and most of the unpleasant surprises in this business stop being surprises.
Sensitive goods come out of the parcel
Essential oils, care solutions, lubricants, batteries and glue are named. They are removed before dispatch, not refused at checkout, so the first you hear of it may be a lighter parcel. What can ship has the longer list.
Customs charges are yours
Import duty and tax are not the agent side of the deal, in any country. Paying covers what the UK and the EU now charge.
Some categories cannot be professionally inspected
Electronics, branded goods, tickets and cards are called out by name. The stated reason for electronics is blunt: they cannot turn the equipment on to check the quality. What you get is a look, not a test.
Fragile damage sits on your side
If an item is fragile and it breaks in transit, that is the buyer risk. This is the single best reason to think about packaging before you order rather than after.
Custom work needs your chat record
Anything made or altered to order has to be backed by the conversation you had with the seller. Keep it. Without it there is nothing to hold the seller to.
Deposit orders cannot be cancelled
Covered in full below, because it is the one item on this list that can take real money off you with no recourse at all.
Seller quality is a condition, not advice
The wording is specific: choose sellers with more than three hearts who have paid for the Taobao guarantee. Sellers and agent explains what those two signals are actually measuring.
Conditions quoted from the official disclaimers page, read on 2026-09-22. Read the original.
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The clause that has no undo
A deposit order cannot be cancelled, and the deposit is forfeited if the balance is never cleared.
Deposit orders exist for goods that are not ready yet: pre-orders, made-to-order runs, group buys. You pay part now and the rest when the goods exist. The published condition is that this particular order type is outside the normal cancellation route entirely, and that walking away costs you what you already paid.
Nothing else in this process works like that. Every other state on this page has a window, a form, or at least somebody to ask. This one has a decision, made at the moment you submit, and the only version of it you control is the one you make beforehand.
Practical reading: treat a deposit order as a purchase, not a reservation. If you would not be comfortable paying the whole amount today, the deposit is not a cheaper way to find out.
Quoted from the official disclaimers page, read on 2026-09-22. Read the original.