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The most useful hour you spend on a capsule is often an hour spent editing rather than shopping. Prices move, sizes sell out, a photograph is replaced, a delivery estimate expires, and a discount you recorded on a Tuesday is gone by Friday. None of those changes announce themselves. The list has to be revisited deliberately.
Why a list goes stale
Three things age badly in any shopping plan. The first is a price without a date, because a figure from last month looks identical to one from this morning. The second is a delivery estimate, because a transit window measured from a dispatch that never happened means nothing. The third is a decision, because "checking" can sit in a row for weeks and quietly become a purchase you assumed was resolved.
Dating the note fixes the first. Recording the source fixes the second. Reviewing the status fixes the third.
Six status labels
| Status | Means | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Planned | A gap identified, no candidate yet | Find one or two candidates |
| Checking | A candidate exists, a check is outstanding | Ask the question, or drop it |
| Ready | Checks complete, price seen and dated | Order when the timing suits |
| Ordered | Paid for, awaiting dispatch | Watch the dispatch record |
| Delivered / dropped | Finished either way | Archive with a closing note |
| Superseded | A better candidate replaced it | Keep the reason, remove the row |
Six labels are enough. More categories produce a filing system nobody maintains, and the whole point is that the review is quick enough to actually happen.
A review cadence
Three reviews, each with a different job:
- Weekly while planning. Update dates, close resolved checks, and remove anything that has been "checking" for more than seven days without progress.
- The day before ordering. Re-read the size, the price and the conditions you saved. Confirm the address and the delivery estimate.
- The day before travelling. Read only the confirmed column of your tracking records and the final piece count against the bag.
That is roughly ten minutes each time. It is far shorter than the alternative, which is discovering a problem at a station.
The review checklist
- Every price has a date beside it
- Every check has a status of checking, ready or dropped — none blank
- Any row older than a week without movement is resolved or dropped
- Delivery estimates are still estimates, not rewritten as dates
- Coupon conditions have been re-read if the offer is still relevant
- Return windows are still open for anything unopened
- The piece count still fits the bag
- The travel dates and the estimated arrival still leave a buffer
What to keep and what to remove
Keep the reason, remove the clutter. A row that says "dropped — no width available, and the wide fit was out of stock on 22 Oct" is worth more than a deleted row, because it stops you researching the same item again next month. A row that says "that bag I liked" is not a record; it is an unclosed tab.
Export a CSV before a big cleanup if you want a copy you control. The planner stores a saved list in this browser only, so clearing browser data also clears the saved copy — an export is the only version that survives that.
An example review log
| Date | Change | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| 22 Oct (example) | Trousers moved to ready | Inside leg confirmed against chart |
| 24 Oct (example) | Second pair of shoes dropped | Appeared in no planned combination |
| 25 Oct (example) | Bag price updated | Price seen again, still an estimate |
| 27 Oct (example) | Delivery estimate expired | No dispatch confirmation by the date recorded |
Four lines, and the plan is now genuinely current. That is the whole discipline: date the change, write the reason, and close the row.
When the review is finished, go back to the planner on the home page to re-check the totals and the combination count. If you have not compared candidates yet, comparing product details side by side is the right first step, and separating the parts of your budget shows where an updated estimate belongs.