Shopify Currency Conversion and Pricing Setup

Bring margin by market, not just a price list. A useful brief gives product cost, shipping cost to each market and the conversion fee, so the specialist can see where a converted price loses money. Without that, you get prices that look tidy and earn less.

Ask whether they would convert or fix prices, and why. The right answer depends on your catalogue and your markets. A specialist with one answer for every store isn't looking at yours.

Check they test the whole path. Product page, cart, checkout, discount codes, gift cards, shipping rates, order emails and refunds should all show the right currency. Apps and theme sections that print prices in your base currency by mistake are an easy loose end to miss.

Ask for a price table to sign off. Before anything goes live, a careful specialist shows you every product's price in each currency, with the margin left after the conversion fee. Approving a table is quick; finding a loss-making price after launch isn't.

Ask how the books will cope. Your accounts need one reporting currency, and payouts, conversion fees and refunds all have to land in it cleanly. A good specialist will want a word with your bookkeeper before new currencies go live.

Agree who maintains prices afterwards. Fixed prices per market are a second price list. Before the specialist hands over, agree who updates it when costs or promotions change, and how often someone reviews converted prices as rates move.

Warning signs:

- A promised conversion lift from local pricing.

- A display-only currency widget offered as the whole solution.

- No plan for gift cards, discounts or refunds.

Automatic conversion or fixed prices. Converted prices move with exchange rates, so a product's price abroad changes without anyone deciding it should. On any plan you can instead set fixed prices or percentage adjustments per market, which puts you back in charge of the number but gives you another price list to maintain.

Rounding. Converted prices can be rounded so shoppers don't see €27.43. Rounding is optional, and if a market needs specific price points, fixed prices do that job better.

The fee on every order. Shopify Payments charges a currency conversion fee: 1.5% for US stores and 2% in most other countries. It comes off your margin on each converted order, so build it into market prices rather than absorbing it quietly. Check which currency you are paid out in, too.

Discounts, gift cards and shipping. A fixed-amount discount code, a gift card balance and a free-shipping threshold all need a value that makes sense in each currency. Decide them deliberately rather than accepting whatever conversion produces.

Refunds. A refund can convert at a different rate from the original sale, so the amount leaving your account won't always match what came in. Your bookkeeper needs to know how to record the difference.

One reporting currency. However many currencies customers pay in, the books need one. Agree how sales, fees and refunds in other currencies get recorded before you switch them on, not at year end.

Shopify's pricing tools cost nothing extra. The ongoing cost is the conversion fee; the one-off cost is the setup work.

Six jobs, from the pricing decision to the loose ends: