If you are a Daraz seller in Pakistan, fake COD orders are not a new problem. You have seen it — a customer places an order, you pack it, hand it to TCS or Leopards, and three days later the parcel comes back. Reason: customer refused. Reason given: "I never ordered this."
You lose the forward shipping fee. You lose the return shipping fee. Your Daraz seller metrics take a hit. And there is nothing you can do about it — because you have no proof the customer ever agreed to receive the order in the first place.
This guide covers exactly what to do about it: how fake orders damage your Daraz seller account, how to verify customers before you ship, and how to build the evidence trail that wins disputes.
How Fake Orders Damage Your Daraz Seller Account
Most Daraz sellers think of fake orders as just a shipping cost problem. They are also a metrics problem — and your Daraz seller score determines how visible your products are and how quickly you get paid.
A Daraz seller running 300 COD orders per month with a 30% fake rate is generating 90 returns per month. Each return is counted against your account. Over 3–6 months, this drags your seller metrics into the range where Daraz starts de-prioritising your listings — meaning even your genuine orders decrease because fewer buyers see your products.
The double hit: Fake orders do not just cost you shipping money. They actively reduce your future genuine orders by suppressing your Daraz seller ranking. Fixing your RTO rate is not just a cost issue — it is a growth issue.
Why Daraz Alone Cannot Protect You
Daraz has its own order management system for orders placed on its platform. But there are two situations where Daraz gives you no protection at all:
Situation 1: Your Direct COD Orders (Outside Daraz)
Most active Daraz sellers also sell directly — through Facebook pages, Instagram shops, WhatsApp broadcasts, or their own website. These direct orders have no Daraz infrastructure behind them. No fraud detection. No buyer verification. No dispute mechanism. If a customer refuses a direct COD order, you have no recourse unless you built your own evidence trail.
This is where the majority of fake order losses happen for established Daraz sellers — not on the platform itself, but on the direct channel where margins are higher and protections are zero.
Situation 2: Daraz Orders Shipped via Your Own Couriers
Some Daraz sellers fulfil certain orders via their own courier accounts (TCS, Leopards, Trax) for faster delivery or better rates. When a customer refuses these orders, you deal directly with the courier — and the courier wants evidence that the customer agreed to receive the package. Daraz's system gives you no help here.
Bottom line: Daraz protects you on their platform's payment and logistics flow. It does not protect you on direct orders, and it cannot give you the cryptographic evidence that couriers require for dispute claims. That is a gap you have to fill yourself.
The Real Cost of Fake Orders for a Daraz Seller
Let us calculate what fake orders are actually costing you per month. This is based on a mid-size Daraz seller running 300 direct COD orders per month alongside their Daraz store:
Monthly Fake Order Loss Calculator — 300 direct orders, 30% fake rate
That is PKR 792,000 per year in preventable losses for a seller doing 300 direct COD orders per month. For sellers doing 500 or 1,000 orders per month, the numbers scale accordingly.
The Solution: Verify Every Customer Before You Ship
The single most effective thing any Daraz seller can do for their direct COD orders is to send every customer a WhatsApp message asking them to confirm the order before you dispatch it. This does two things:
- Filters fake orders automatically. A customer who placed an order on impulse or with no intention of paying will either tap "Cancel" or ignore the message. You cancel the order at zero cost — no shipping, no return, no metric damage.
- Creates evidence. A customer who taps "Confirm" has created a timestamped record that they agreed to receive the order. If they later refuse at the door, that record is your proof.
What the Customer Sees
Assalam o Alaikum! 👋
Aap ka order receive hua:
Order #4821
Product: Ladies Kurti (Size M, Red)
Amount: PKR 1,800 (Cash on Delivery)
Address: House 7, Street 3, Gulshan-e-Ravi, Lahore
Kya aap ye order confirm karna chahte hain?
The customer taps one button. Their response — along with their WhatsApp number, the exact timestamp, and the order details — is recorded and locked into a SHA-256 evidence PDF. You dispatch only when you see the confirmation. You never ship into the dark again.
WhatsApp vs Other Confirmation Methods
Pakistani customers do not respond to SMS the way they respond to WhatsApp. Here is the difference across channels:
WhatsApp Confirmation
Response rate. Highest of all channels. Customers are already on WhatsApp all day. One tap to confirm. Evidence-grade record created automatically.
SMS OTP
Response rate. Many customers treat commercial SMS as spam. OTP adds friction. No interactive buttons — customer must navigate to a link.
Manual Phone Call
Answer rate — but does not scale past 50 orders/day. Calls take 2–5 minutes each. No tamper-proof record. Staff cost is significant.
Email Confirmation
Open rate in Pakistan. Most COD customers in Pakistan rarely check email. Good as a backup channel but not a primary method.
How to Set Up WhatsApp Confirmation for Your Direct Orders
Here is the exact process for a Daraz seller to get WhatsApp confirmation running on their direct COD orders:
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Create a free OrderWitness account
Sign up at app.orderwitness.com. The free plan covers 50 orders per month — enough to test the full system before committing to a paid plan.
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Set up your business profile
Add your store name, logo, and contact details. These appear in the WhatsApp message customers receive — customers see your brand name, not "OrderWitness." This builds trust and improves confirmation rates.
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Connect your WhatsApp Business number
You need a dedicated WhatsApp Business number (separate SIM from your personal number). Connect it to the official Meta Cloud API via OrderWitness's guided setup — this takes about 20 minutes and requires a Meta Business Manager account.
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Add your first order
Enter the customer's name, phone number, address, and product details. OrderWitness instantly runs a fraud score (0–100) on the order and sends the WhatsApp confirmation message automatically.
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Ship only confirmed orders
Your dashboard shows each order's status in real time: Confirmed, Rejected, or Pending. Only pack and dispatch orders marked Confirmed. Orders with no response after 48 hours auto-cancel.
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Download evidence PDFs when needed
For any confirmed order that later results in a dispute, download the SHA-256 evidence PDF directly from the order page. Submit it to TCS, Leopards, or Trax as part of your dispute claim.
AI Fraud Scoring: Catching Fake Orders Before Confirmation
Some fake orders are placed by repeat offenders — phone numbers that have refused deliveries multiple times, or organised groups placing bulk fake orders to drain a seller's inventory. Sending a WhatsApp confirmation to these numbers is pointless; they will either confirm and still refuse, or never respond.
This is where AI fraud scoring helps. Every order you add to OrderWitness is scored from 0 to 100 the moment it is created, based on signals like:
| Fraud Signal | What It Detects | Risk Level |
|---|---|---|
| Repeat rejection history | Phone number has refused past orders | High |
| Order velocity | Same number placed 3+ orders in 24 hours | High |
| Off-hours ordering | Order placed between 1am–5am | Medium |
| Incomplete address | Missing house number, area code | Medium |
| Blacklisted number | Known fraud number from network list | Critical |
| High value, first-time customer | New number placing unusually large order | Medium |
| Area rejection rate | High RTO rate historically for this zone | Low |
Orders scoring above 70 are automatically held for your review before any confirmation is sent. Orders scoring above 85 can be configured to auto-cancel. This means your highest-risk orders never reach the shipping stage — saving the WhatsApp message cost, the confirmation wait time, and the shipping cost entirely.
Building the Evidence Trail That Wins Courier Disputes
When a customer refuses your COD shipment and you want to dispute the return shipping charge with TCS or Leopards, you need to show the courier that the customer agreed to receive the order before you dispatched it. This is where most Daraz sellers fail — they have a Facebook message, a WhatsApp chat screenshot, or nothing at all.
Here is what actually works and what does not:
| Evidence Type | Accepted by Couriers? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Facebook DM screenshot | ✗ Not accepted | Cannot verify authenticity, no order specifics |
| WhatsApp chat screenshot | ✗ Rarely accepted | Can be easily edited, no cryptographic proof |
| Order form submission | ✗ Insufficient | Does not prove customer agreed to COD delivery |
| Phone call record | ✗ Not accepted | No transcript, content unverifiable |
| SHA-256 Evidence PDF | ✓ Accepted | Tamper-proof, timestamped, independently verifiable hash |
| WhatsApp API confirmation + Evidence PDF | ✓ Strongest | Tied to customer phone number + cryptographic hash |
The SHA-256 evidence PDF generated by OrderWitness contains the customer's phone number, their exact button tap response, the timestamp in Pakistan Standard Time, and a hash that can be independently verified to prove the document has not been altered. TCS, Leopards Courier, and Trax accept this document in formal dispute claims.
Real outcome: A Daraz seller using direct COD alongside their Daraz store submitted an OrderWitness evidence PDF to Leopards Courier after a customer refused a PKR 8,500 order and claimed they never placed it. Leopards accepted the SHA-256 hash as proof of customer confirmation and waived the return fee. Without the evidence PDF, the dispute would have been closed in the customer's favour.
Converting High-Risk COD Orders to Prepaid
Not every fake order should be cancelled. Some medium-risk customers (fraud score 40–65) are genuinely interested in the product but are repeat offenders due to circumstance — they placed and cancelled before because of genuine delivery issues, not fraud.
For these orders, a smarter move than cancellation is to offer a prepaid option. After the customer confirms the order on WhatsApp, OrderWitness sends a second automated message:
"✅ Your order is confirmed! Pay PKR 300 advance via EasyPaisa (0311-XXXXXXX) and get 10% off + priority dispatch. Otherwise, your COD order ships within 24 hours as normal."
Genuine customers take the prepaid offer — they get a discount, and you get certainty. Customers who planned to refuse do not pay anything, flagging the order for your manual review. Sellers using this method reduce RTO on their medium-risk order segment by 55–70%.
What Results to Expect in the First 30 Days
Based on Daraz sellers and direct COD businesses using OrderWitness, here are realistic 30-day outcomes:
| Metric | Before OrderWitness | After 30 Days |
|---|---|---|
| Fake order rate | 25–40% | 5–12% |
| Monthly shipping cost wasted | PKR 50,000–150,000 | PKR 10,000–30,000 |
| Orders confirmed before dispatch | 0% | 65–80% of all orders |
| Evidence available for disputes | None | 100% of confirmed orders |
| Time spent on manual verification | 2–5 min per order | Zero — fully automated |
| Daraz seller return rate metric | High / improving needed | Improving within 4–6 weeks |
Timeline note: Daraz seller metrics update on a rolling basis. You will typically see return rate and cancellation rate improvements reflected in your seller dashboard within 4–6 weeks of reducing fake orders — not immediately. Stick with the system for at least one full month before evaluating metric improvement.
Frequently Asked Questions — Daraz Seller Edition
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