delete unwanted Orders Status categories?

[DrByte]

There are no orders currently assigned to the status entries i want to delete
There are orders that were once assigned to said categories but they were changed to some other status.

When I try to delete one of them I get the error message:

Error: This order status is currently used in the order status history.

I do know that the orders status categories I want to delete do not have any orders showing in that category in the admin.

Yes, but remember those orders that WERE using those "old" statuses? If you look at the order now, you'll see that the "old" status WAS used on that order. And because it's part of the history of the order, that's why it's telling you its "currently used in the order status history".

Where did all these old "extra" order statuses come from anyway? Zen Cart (v1.1 thru 1.5) only has 4 out-of-the-box.

[Axeman]

If the order status has been used in the past but is not in use now and is now empty is there a way to delete it?

[gjh42]

If an order status has been used in the past, it is still part of the order status history and cannot be deleted. You would have to do some advanced database manipulation to remove it from the history (thus falsifying your history, if it matters for PCI compliance).

[Ajeh]

Originally, you had Order Statuses of:
1 Pending
2 Processing
3 Delivered
4 Update

What are your Order Statuses now (as in what do you want them to be)?

[gjh42]

This thread (from Similar Threads at the bottom of the page) may point to the answer you are looking for:
http://www.zen-cart.com/showthread.p...rom-orders-php

Ajeh's advice:

You would need to browse the table:
orders_status_history

and do a search for the:
orders_id...

In that table will be a field named something like orders_status_id. You should be able to change all instances of an id that you want to eliminate to an id that you still want to exist (and is not misleading in its meaning).

Do a database backup before you try anything like this, so you can restore it if you make a mistake.

[Ajeh]

Do keep in mind that before changing the labels/names of the order statuses that you want to plan this out to fix the table names and ids carefully so as not to make a mess of previous orders ...

[Axeman]

Pending
Processing
Delivered
Dispatched
Collected
Part Delivered
Back Order
Customer Returning Item
Delivered - Part Paid
Undelivered
Ready For Collection
Reserved
Delivered - Unpaid
Returned
Refunded


In my case the orders that would be affected by the changes would be about 5 years old.