What is Click & Collect?

Click & Collect is the umbrella term for online ordering followed by customer pickup at a physical location — a store, a locker, a partner pickup point, or curbside. It overlaps with BOPIS but is the broader European term that often includes scheduled time slots and non-store handover points.

Definition

A Click & Collect flow runs the order through the OMS like any other online sale, but the fulfillment node is fixed at order time: a chosen store, locker, or service point. The OMS allocates inventory to that node, generates a pick task or transfer order, and tracks the order until handover. Time slot management, identity verification at pickup, and notification orchestration are part of the experience and are usually exposed as APIs and events to the storefront API, customer journey tools, and partner systems via webhooks and event-driven architecture. When the chosen point is not the source of stock, the OMS also orchestrates an internal transfer through DOM and fulfillment partners.

Why it matters

Click & Collect lowers last-mile cost dramatically and gives customers control over when and where they receive their order. It also drives footfall into stores and partner networks, which raises attach sales and supports relationships in physical retail. From an OMS standpoint, the discipline it requires — slot capacity, store labor planning, accurate inventory, identity at handover — is the same discipline that underpins broader omnichannel maturity. Brands that operate Click & Collect well tend to perform better on BOPIS, ship-from-store, and endless aisle as a result.

Use cases

A grocery retailer offers Click & Collect with timed slots for fresh and frozen, balancing pick capacity per store through OMS rules and sending status updates through webhooks to the app and SMS provider. A fashion brand uses partner parcel lockers in city centers for late-day pickups, integrated as fulfillment nodes inside the OMS. A consumer electronics player runs curbside handover for bulky items, using order orchestration to coordinate store staff dispatch with customer arrival time. In all of these, Click & Collect is built as a first-class fulfillment mode in the OMS, not a bolt-on, so that inventory, payment solutions, returns, and the customer journey stay coherent.

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