paypal issues: Pending unilateral

[JosieR]

I had someone set up my online store. The products are downloadable. I had my first customer but did not recieve my payment from them. When they login to get their product it gives them this message:
PayPal status: Pending unilateral @ 12:48:46 Feb 21, 2009 PST.

I dont know how to fix this or what I did incorrect. Any suggestions would be appreciated

[DrByte]

"Pending Unilateral" means that in your Zen Cart admin settings for the PayPal Website Payments Standard module, you've specified an email address that's not yet associated with a PayPal account.

You need to do these steps:
1. Set the correct email address for your real PayPal merchant/business account in your Zen Cart module settings. (Take note of the bad address you're replacing, to use in thenext step:)
2. Go to PayPal.com and click on Profile, then Email Addresses, and add whatever email address was wrongly set in your Zen Cart ... if you don't do this, then you won't be able to collect the payment. After 30 days if unclaimed it will be returned to the customer's PayPal account.

[JosieR]

Thank You! I found where the problem was in zencart. They didnt specify my paypal address when they set it up. Youre a lifesaver. Josie

[sslurper]

After you fix the email problem, which I had, does the payment post automatically or do you need to do something else to manually receive the pending payment?

[DrByte]

Yes, the payment posts automatically to your account after you add the email address to your account.

Further, you really should be using Express Checkout instead of Website Payments Standard. You'll thank yourself later.