Orders and payment links

The AI can take an order in a chat, but it can never create one on its own. It prepares a quote, the customer confirms that exact quote, and only then is the order recorded and sent to your team. This page explains the flow, what your team sees, and how payment fits in.

What you need#

The order flow end to end#

1. The customer asks to order. The AI searches your catalog item by item and asks only for what is missing: for delivery, a callable phone number (8 to 15 digits), an address and an area; for pickup, the contact details your setup requires. The phone number must come from the customer's own messages or their stored profile. The AI cannot invent it.
2. The AI prepares a quote. It saves an order proposal with a code such as ORD-7K3M2Q, the items, quantities, notes, delivery fee and total. The quote is valid for 15 minutes.
3. The customer sees a recap. The system writes the recap text and the AI sends it word for word. The recap is not shortened, even on channels with tight length limits.
4. The customer confirms. The next customer message must be a plain yes: for example "yes", "ok", "نعم", "تمام", "ثبته", a thumbs-up, or the bare code, or CONFIRM ORD-7K3M2Q.
5. Sela re-checks everything. Before creating the order it verifies that the quote has not expired, the AI is still allowed to act, the customer's newest message is the one confirming, the phone is grounded in what the customer said, and that current prices, delivery fee, offer terms and item availability still match the quote.
6. The order is committed in one step. A single transaction records the order (status submitted) and puts it in your team's queue. Doing it twice for the same quote is safe: it will not create a duplicate.
7. The customer gets a receipt message. It says the order was sent to the team. The AI does not say "confirmed" or "being prepared" until your team acts.

What counts as a confirmation#

Only a bare affirmation counts. Any extra word turns it into an edit.

Quote expiry and price changes#

• A quote expires 15 minutes after it is prepared. If the customer says yes to an expired quote, the AI prepares one fresh quote and asks again. It does not create the order from the old one.
• If any price, delivery fee, offer revision or availability changed since the quote, the customer must approve a new quote. Price changes always require this.
• One quote can hold 1 to 50 lines, quantity 1 to 100 per line, and a note of up to 1,000 characters per item.
• A quote for an approved offer or bundle (from Business records) covers exactly one offer. Offers that involve prizes, gifts or conditional redemption are handed to staff instead of being sold automatically.

Delivery settings#

Open Environment and find Delivery & fees (Restaurant and Store workspaces). Choose a Delivery pricing mode:

Pick the Currency (IQD or USD), enter 0 for a free area (a blank field is not free), and select Save at the bottom of the page. Set delivery before enabling delivery orders, or customers will hear that no delivery price is configured.

Publish your branches and current offers in Business records so the AI can answer "are you open?" and honor approved bundles. See Multiple branches.

What your team sees#

Restaurants: Operations inbox#

Open Operations inbox (in the Conversations group). For restaurants it shows an Orders board:

Actions on a card:

• Approve order sends the customer your approval message.
• Reject asks for a reason of at least 3 characters. The customer receives that message and it is saved for audit. The button reads Reject and notify.
• Mark delivered or Mark picked up completes an active order.
• Open conversation jumps to the chat.

Approval and rejection texts sent automatically come from your order settings. The defaults tell the customer their order is confirmed and being prepared once you approve it.

The board requires the AI Assist add-on. Reviewers need the relevant jobs or boards permissions. See Team, roles and permissions.

Stores and other workspaces#

Store workspaces use the same quote, confirmation and commit steps, and the order is recorded on the platform. The dashboard's dedicated Orders board is for restaurants. Other workspaces see the generic operations inbox, and no separate order list for stores is documented here. If you sell online with a store, watch the conversation in the Inbox and confirm your team sees new orders before going live.

Notifications to your systems#

If you use the API, order events (order.created, order.approved, order.rejected, order.arrived) can be sent to your systems. See Restaurant order integration and Webhooks.

Payment links and customer billing#

There are two separate payment things in Sela. Neither is an AI feature.

Points to know:

• The AI never sends a payment link, even if a customer asks. It will offer team help instead.
• Billing needs the billing permission and the Operations plan or higher. Its screen is titled Files, approvals & billing, with a Customer billing tab.
• The backend can create a Wayl payment link for an approved invoice installment tied to a conversation, but the dashboard does not currently show a button for it. Do not promise customers an online payment link unless your Sela contact has confirmed it for your account.
• Sela does not show a payout or merchant setting for customer payments. Who receives money from a customer payment link has not been verified in the product, so confirm settlement with Sela before you use one.

Troubleshooting#