AI Checkout — Merchant Beta Guide

Welcome to the Swft AI Checkout pilot. This guide takes you from zero to a working AI checkout in about 30 minutes.

What you’re getting

Three modes, all served from a single iframe overlay on your store:

• Mode A — Conversational checkout. AI replaces the form-based checkout with a friendly chat. Customer types email, picks shipping, pays. No catalog or policy knowledge needed. Always on.
• Mode B — Sales assistant. AI answers product questions (“does this come in blue?”) using your WooCommerce catalog. Cites products and renders cards inline. Opt-in, costs ~$0.001/question.
• Mode C — Objection handler. AI answers concerns (“how long is shipping?”) using your policy pages and any custom knowledge you add. Always cites the source. Opt-in, costs ~$0.005/objection.

Prerequisites

• WooCommerce store with the Swft Checkout plugin installed and connected (you should already be using standard Swft checkout)
• Your Swft API key (find it in the dashboard sidebar or wp-admin → Settings → Swft)
• Stripe Connect onboarded for live payments

1. Enable AI Checkout

1. Open your Swft Dashboard at https://app.swft.co.uk
2. Click AI Checkout in the sidebar
3. Open the Settings tab
4. Set Monthly cap to your desired ceiling (default $50, change anytime)
5. Set Alert email to where you want the 80%-threshold warning sent
6. Leave Mode B and Mode C off for now — you’ll turn them on after step 3.

2. Verify Mode A is live

Mode A is on automatically once your monthly cap is greater than 0.

1. Open any product page on your store in an incognito window
2. Look for the “Buy via AI” button next to “Add to cart”
3. Click it — the chat should open in a slide-out panel
4. Walk through: email → address → shipping → payment
5. Use Stripe’s test card 4242 4242 4242 4242 (any future date / any CVC)
6. Verify the order appears in WooCommerce as normal

If the button doesn’t appear, check your dashboard’s Settings → Monthly cap is greater than 0 and swft_api_key is configured.

3. Sync your catalog (Mode B)

Mode B needs your products embedded into the AI’s knowledge base.

1. Trigger the bulk catalog scan from the WP admin:

   POST https://yourstore.com/wp-admin/admin-ajax.php?action=swft_ai_chat_catalog_scan&cursor=0&page_size=200

   (Or use a tool like Postman; you’ll need a logged-in admin cookie.)
2. Iterate cursor until the response shows next_cursor: null
3. Confirm via the dashboard Knowledge tab — chunk count should match approximately your published product count

Subsequent product saves auto-sync. No further action needed.

4. Enable Mode B

1. Dashboard → AI Checkout → Settings → toggle Mode B
2. Save
3. Test: open a product page, click “Buy via AI”, and ask a question about another product (“do you sell anything for hiking?”)
4. The AI should answer with product cards from your catalog. Verify the answer doesn’t quote prices (prices live on the cards, not in the answer text).

5. Sync your policies (Mode C)

Mode C grounds objection answers in your real policy pages.

1. Make sure your policy pages have one of these slugs: shipping, returns, refund, faq, sizing, delivery, policy (e.g. /shipping-policy, /returns, /faq)
2. Save the page in WP — the plugin will auto-sync it
3. For custom knowledge that isn’t in a page (e.g. “We’re a UK family business since 1994”), use the dashboard’s Knowledge → Manual entries panel
4. Confirm via Knowledge tab — “Other chunks (policies, FAQ)” should be > 0

6. Enable Mode C

1. Dashboard → AI Checkout → Settings → toggle Mode C
2. Save
3. Test: open the chat, ask “how long is shipping?” — the AI should answer with a citation linking to your shipping policy page

7. Watch the dashboard

For the first week of beta, check daily:

• Overview tab — completed orders, conversion rate, drop-off chart
• Transcripts tab — review at least 5 chats per day. Look for:
  • Hallucinated product info (Mode B)
  • Uncited or fabricated policy answers (Mode C)
  • Customers giving up at a specific step
• Cost in the Settings tab — make sure your spend trajectory is sustainable

What to do if things go wrong

Symptom	Likely cause	Action
”Buy via AI” button missing	Monthly cap = 0, or Swft plugin disabled	Check dashboard Settings + plugin
Chat opens but errors immediately	API unreachable / merchant API key invalid	Hit the health endpoint (see below)
Mode B says “I don’t have a match” for known products	Catalog not synced	Re-run the bulk scan
Mode C makes up policy details	Policy pages not synced	Verify the page slugs match the auto-extract list
Spend climbing too fast	LLM-heavy traffic	Lower the monthly cap or set Mode B/C off
Customers complaining about chat quality	Eval suite below threshold	Email [email protected] with transcript IDs

Health check

Hit the health endpoint to see the system’s view of your store:

curl -H "x-swft-api-key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.swft.co.uk/health/ai-chat

Returns JSON with LLM/embedding status, knowledge stats, mode toggles, and current cost vs cap. Useful for debugging.

What’s not in the beta

The following are explicitly out of scope and may break or no-op:

• Voice mode (mic icon greyed)
• Cross-merchant identity (“Swft Buyer Profile”)
• Helpdesk integrations (Zendesk, Helpscout)
• File uploads to KB (PDF/docx)
• URL-list KB ingestion
• Branding (accent colour, intro message)
• Mid-chat add-to-cart from product cards (today they’re informational only)

These ship after beta.

Feedback

Email [email protected] with:

• Your store URL
• Approximate dates of the issue
• Specific transcript IDs (visible in dashboard Transcripts tab) — we can look them up directly

Your transcripts are already auto-stored for 30 days; we don’t need screenshots.