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osCommerce

The e-commerce.

PayPal and Credit Cards


Maureen

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My PayPal setting (in PayPal account profile) has been set to allow payments without a PayPal account since PayPal first initiated that change. Until very recently, my site worked perfectly and I never noticed the "Note" mention in the Learn More link next to the setting (because, I assume, it was not always there):

 

Note: If you have turned on Auto Return and have chosen to turn on PayPal Account Optional for new users, a new user will not be automatically directed back to your website, but will be given the option to return. (A new user, BTW, is someone using a credit card to make the purchase.)

 

I've seen numerous posts here about customers not being returned to the site for payment completion and a few responsed that state the above as the reason. If the customer does not return to the site, the order process does not complete. One even suggested that some (hopefully many) of us contact PayPal about this -- so I did.

 

I was first told that yes, this had to do with recent changes PayPal made to the system and I requested a Tech Support contact number. When I finally got through to tech support he insisted that it has always been this way. Why then, I asked, were my credit card customers always returned to my site until recently -- something had to have changed.

 

He then told me that it is because for "new customers" they have to 1) display that the payment successfully processed and 2) give them the option to save their information by opening a PayPal account. "All well and good" I replied, "but that doesn't help us with ecommerce sites." I do understand the marketing opportunity from PayPal point of view now they need to understand the impact it will have on us and ultimately on them. If we lose customers there will be that many less to sign up for new PayPal accounts, right?

 

I suggested that if PayPal would not change this maybe they would consider making one of the following changes:

-- If a new customer has not clicked on the continue button within 30 secs it is highly unlikely the button is going to be clicked on; redirect the customer to the merchant site after 30 sec (maybe too long but its only a suggestion)

-- Move the darn Return to Merchant link off the bottom of the page where NO customer is going to scroll to find and rename it to something like "Complete your Purchase-Return to Merchant"

 

For a company like PayPal, redesigning the way credit card customers are handled so that the customer is returned to the merchant site automatically should be child's play and we shouldn't have to request that bandaids be applied to something they broke. The Tech did take my information and said he was writing up a feedback report for this issue to be addressed.

 

So...maybe it *is* a good idea for all of you who are experiencing this problem to contact PayPal and speak directly to the Merchant Technical Support department. While it may be a longshot it is better than scratching our heads and sticking up javascript alerts (which I did and I hate!) and new contributions to handle unprocessed orders. PayPal want our customers as leads, they should make it right!

 

Please don't just think about it -- if this affects your ecommerce site, it affects your customers and your bottom line! Call PayPal...

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