Shopify gift card email not sending — the code never reached the recipient.

Four products can look like “Shopify emailed the customer about money or a code.” They do not share a toggle or a send log. Native gift card notification lives in Shopify admin: Settings → Notifications → Customer notifications → Gift card created (the label Shopify shows for the gift-card issue email). It fires when a gift card is issued with a recipient email and Notify customer is on — not when a storefront checkout of regular products completes, not when a fulfillment ships, not when money is refunded, and not when staff clicks Send invoice on a draft.

Native order confirmation is order confirmation email not sending. Shipping confirmation is shipping confirmation email not sending. Refund / order cancelled is refund email not sending. Draft order invoice is draft order invoice not sending. Klaviyo “gift card” flows live in a Klaviyo send log — if that is what is missing, that is Klaviyo flow not sending, not this page. This page is only native Shopify Gift card created: the email with the code and balance Shopify sends when a gift card is issued.

Six ordinary reasons that template never lands: it is still off, Notify customer was never checked on issue, the gift card has no recipient email, you tested order confirmation instead, the card was already emailed / disabled / owned by a third-party gift-card app, or sender / spam hid a send that did fire. Walk them in that order. You already pay for Shopify. You do not need a gift-card marketplace app to read the notification list.

Open Settings → Notifications → Customer notifications. Find Gift card created (Shopify’s native gift-card issue email). Read the on/off state, not the subject line, not a preview, not Order confirmation next to it. Disabled does not send. A staffer who turned native mail off “so Klaviyo can own gift cards” and then never published the Klaviyo flow leaves a hole that looks like Shopify is broken.

Order confirmation, Shipping confirmation, Order refund, Order cancelled, and Draft order invoice are different templates. A buyer who paid for a gift-card product may get order confirmation for the purchase and still never get Gift card created for the code if that template is off. Those are two emails for two events.

Turn Gift card created on only if native Shopify is supposed to send the code. If a third-party gift-card or loyalty app is supposed to send it instead, leave this template off on purpose and go fix that app. Do not leave both off. Do not leave both on unless you want two emails for one code.

Creating a gift card under Products → Gift cards does not always email the recipient. Staff who issue cards for store credit, returns, or VIP comps often leave Notify customer unchecked on purpose — or forget it. The gift card exists in admin with a code and a balance. The email never left.

Open the gift card timeline / activity. Look for a gift-card notification sent event, not just gift card created. If staff issued the card and copied the code into Slack or a DM instead, Shopify did exactly what it was told — nothing to send. Holiday and support teams hit this constantly.

A gift-card product sold at checkout is different from a manual issue: Shopify usually creates the gift card and can send Gift card created to the recipient email collected at checkout. If that recipient field was blank or the buyer bought “for myself” without an alternate recipient, check the gift card record, not the order alone. Order confirmation for the purchase is still not this template.

Native Gift card created sends to the recipient email on the gift card. Open Products → Gift cards → the card. If there is no recipient email, Shopify has nowhere to send. Phone-only VIP comps, a staffer who typed the store’s own address, or a placeholder like test@example.com will all look like “Shopify is not sending.”

A staff email on the card is not the recipient. BCC to the owner is not proof the customer got it. The gift card activity can show the card created without “Gift card email sent to…”. Read that event, not the balance line.

If Shopify did send and the address is wrong, correct the recipient email and resend the gift card notification from the gift card page (Shopify’s resend / send again control). Resend does not fix a template that is off, and it does not invent a send that was never notified.

Preview in the notification editor and Send test email prove the template renders. They do not prove a live gift card issue fires it. A paid storefront checkout of regular products proves order confirmation — see /order-confirmation-email-not-sending— not Gift card created. Buying a gift-card product and only reading the order confirmation inbox is how teams declare “gift card mail works” while the recipient never got the code.

Honest test: issue a gift card (or buy a gift-card product) with a real inbox you own that is not the store’s staff address. Leave Notify customer on. Wait a minute. Then search that inbox and spam for the store name and the words gift card. Open the gift card activity and look for the notification-sent event. If the activity is silent, the bug is template / Notify customer / missing email — not “Shopify email is down.”

Shopify Flow “send internal email” is staff mail. It is not this template. If what you built is a Flow workflow that never runs, that is Shopify Flow not running, not a gift-card-notification bug.

Once Gift card created already sent, a second “where is my code” ticket is often spam, a wrong inbox, or the recipient looking for order confirmation instead. Resend from the gift card page if Shopify already sent once. Do not install a second gift-card app to “make sure it fires.”

A disabled, expired, or fully redeemed gift card is not a notification bug — the code may still have been emailed. Open the gift card status before you rebuild templates. Marketplace, POS, and some gift-card / loyalty apps create cards that never took the native Gift card created path. Those often skip or replace native mail. Name whether the silent record is a native Shopify gift card or an app-owned card before you change Settings → Notifications.

Draft order invoice is a pay-link email for an unpaid draft — different product, different template: /draft-order-invoice-not-sending. Do not debug gift card codes on a draft that never became a gift card.

Shopify can send and the recipient still reports nothing. Open Settings → Notifications and read the sender email. A custom from-address without authenticated DNS (SPF / DKIM for the domain Shopify tells you to add) lands in spam, or is dropped. A shared @shopifyemail.com from-address also gets filtered on some inboxes. BCC to the owner is not proof the recipient got it — BCC can arrive while the To: line bounced.

On the gift card activity, look for a notification-sent event, not just gift card created. If Shopify says it sent, have the recipient search spam, promotions, and the exact from-address. If Shopify does not say it sent, go back to template / Notify customer / recipient email — do not buy a deliverability app for a mail that never left.

Do not install a second gift-card-email app to “make sure it fires.” You will double-email the next recipient who was never the bug. Shopify Email (marketing campaigns) is also not this template — mixing them is how you pay for two products and still send none.

Stay DIY if you can spend one afternoon on the list above: template on, Notify customer checked, recipient email on the gift card, real gift card issue (not a regular checkout test), sender/spam. Issue one live gift card to an inbox you own. Read the inbox. That is the whole playbook. No agency required. Short answers also live on the merchant FAQ. Related troubleshooting: order confirmation not sending (paid checkout), shipping confirmation not sending, refund / cancel not sending, draft order invoice not sending, Klaviyo flow not sending.

Pay for help when the work is not the notification toggle — it is connecting the stack you already have so gift card mail, order mail, and exceptions are one live path instead of a native template plus a Klaviyo draft plus a gift-card app you forgot, lead capture is not dying in DMs, and exceptions show up in a channel you already check. That is the Latch AI Ops install.

What $997 USD one-time buys: lead capture on the live store, ops alerts in a channel you already check, and a checkout-ready workflow. 72 hours after collaborator access, not after payment. One live Shopify store. Access plus a delivery thread. Store URL collected at checkout. Not a SaaS seat, not a notification rebuild, not a Klaviyo rebuild, not a Gorgias implementation, not a support VA, not a brand or theme job.

Other shops’ public ranges, not testimonials: a Shopify Flow or recovery-app install typically runs $500–$2,500. A Klaviyo-only flow rebuild typically runs $2,000–$5,000. $997 is the cheap end of that work, sold as a 72-hour install of three systems — not as a ticket-cut number or recovered checkout revenue.

What it does not buy: fewer WISMO tickets, recovered checkout revenue, a lift in conversion, or a case study. Latch AI Ops has not published customer proof because there are no customers yet. You are buying the install.

Checkout is on Whop. Operator is Nico. United States offer. You can revoke collaborator access after handoff. We do not take owner passwords.