[Not a bug] Gift Certificate sequence problem

[finlander]

When a customer initially redeems a gift certificate on Step 2 of 3 page during checkout, the customer then goes to Step 3 of 3 page, and gets a notice that redemption of the gift certificate was successful and that the funds are in the customer's account.

Yay!, that's great. However, at the time of this notice, when the customer arrives at the Step 3 of 3 page, the gift certificate money has only been made available to the customer -- it has not been applied to the current order.

So, the customer is sitting there on Step 3 of 3, thinking that (or figuring that or wondering if) the gift certificate money has been applied to the current order ... but it has not been applied. I realize that the customer needs to go back to Step 2 at this point, in order to apply the money to the current order, but the customer is unlikely to know what is going on at this point. The customer is just looking at the computer screen and wondering why payment in full is still due in the Order Total. Or worse! The customer thinks the gift cert money was applied (it was not) and the customer punches Confirm Order, and then at that point it's a much bigger problem, because the transaction has completed w/o the gift money getting applied to the transaction.

I've thought that a bit more of a message could be given in the 'Congrats, you redeemed a gift cert' message, such as "if you are on Step 3 of 3 go back to Step 2 and apply your money" but the problem with that is then any customer who redeems a gift cert via the ordinary redemption page (not during checkout) would also get that revised message, i.e., a Congrats message talking about checkout pages, and so that shopper is then wondering, 'why the heck are they telling me about checkout pages when I'm not in a checkout sequence.'

I noticed this confusing issue as I was testing redemption of gift cert during checkout. As soon as I got to the Step 3 of 3, I immediately wondered "what the heck" "did it get applied to the current order or not" .. some customers might punch confirm order at that point, and that would really mess things up with that transaction and cause negativity with the customer over the confusion.

... thought I would bring it to your attention for possible fix in a future release ...

Jim

[finlander]

Hi,

Does the Zen Cart team know about this?

Part of the stock code below is, by default, commented out, and may be the reason for an unusual Gift Cert sequence during checkout when redemption of gift cert is occurring during checkout. It's located in modules/order_total/ot_gv.php

When a shopper performs a redemption on Step 2 while checking out, the next page that appears is Step 3, with the green "error" flag 'Congrats you redeemed...' message. (It's actually a success flag.) Trouble is, the shopper may not know to go back to Step 2 to apply the new gift cert funds to the current order, and after taking a look at the define for ERROR_REDEEMED_AMOUNT, it does not appear feasible to add on a message to the shopper in the green flag. This is because (1) the define ends with the amount of the gift cert -- another define for an add on special message in the green flag would have to drop in after the gift cert amount in the green flag. It's possible, but quite a bit of coding to just add a message to the shopper about going back to Step 2; and (2) incidentally, if the shopper does click Edit Billing/Payment Information while on Step 3, under the green flag, then when Step 2 appears the green flag (in my tests) is also loaded there as well. Since it would be the same special add on message as on Step 3, then it wouldn't make sense to be saying "go back to Step 2" on a flag that appears on Step 2 after the shopper has gone back to Step 2.

So, wouldn't the best way to fix this be to simply keep the shopper on Step 2 after the redemption? Throw the green flag on Step 2 immediately after redemption, keep the shopper there, and if the 'apply gift funds' box is then available (it should be, because gift funds are now in the shopper's account), then the shopper just scrolls down and applies the funds. Or, if for some reason he doesn't want to, then he can click continue to go to Step 3 w/o applying the newly redeemed funds. Either way, the point is to keep the shopper on Step 2, instead of taking the shopper to Step 3 and throwing the green flag there.

Gift Cert FAQ and the gift cert e-mail sent to gift cert recipients both talk about redeeming during checkout, but if the shopper is not kept on Step 2 after doing a redeem during checkout, then it becomes confusing to the shopper and can be a much bigger problem if the shopper goes ahead and confirms the order on Step 3 w/o realizing that no gift cert funds were applied to the order (though thinking that they were applied).

Did the code below formerly keep the shopper on Step 2? If so, was there a reason that part of it was commented out? And finally, can I put some code in, or back in, that will keep the shopper on Step 2 (as the green flag is thrown) immediately after redeeming a gift cert on Step 2? This would at least fix the problem for now..

Thank you for taking the time to read through this. I also posted about this the other day, but it looks as though it wound up in the wish list area (http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=169325).

in modules/order_total/ot_gv.php at about line 262:

// zen_redirect(zen_href_link(FILENAME_CHECKOUT_PAYMENT, 'error_message=' . urlencode(ERROR_REDEEMED_AMOUNT. $currencies->format($gv_amount)), 'SSL'));
$messageStack->add_session('redemptions',ERROR_REDEEMED_AMOUNT. $currencies->format($gv_amount), 'success' );

[finlander]

I uncommented the code to test.

The shopper is kept on Step 2, so that's cool, but the green Congrats flag did not fire.

[finlander]

Okay, please tell me if this makes sense, i.e., is this by design..

(most recent test)
On initial gift cert redemption on Step 2, if redeem code is entered but NO Payment Method is chosen, then
1. shopper stays on step 2 after clicking Continue and
2. green Congrats flag is fired and
3. red error Please Select Payment Method is also fired.

If, however, redeem code is entered along with selection of Payment Method, on Step 2, then shopper proceeds to Step 3, and green Congrats flag is shown there, on Step 3.

Does this sound right? It doesn't explain why that other code is commented out, but maybe this was a revision at some point?

[DrByte]

Okay, please tell me if this makes sense, i.e., is this by design..

(most recent test)
On initial gift cert redemption on Step 2, if redeem code is entered but NO Payment Method is chosen, then
1. shopper stays on step 2 after clicking Continue and
2. green Congrats flag is fired and
3. red error Please Select Payment Method is also fired.

If, however, redeem code is entered along with selection of Payment Method, on Step 2, then shopper proceeds to Step 3, and green Congrats flag is shown there, on Step 3.

Does this sound right?

Yes, that is by design.

[finlander]

Thanks DrByte, all is well then.

I did notice that once gift cert funds are available for spending, that you don't have to choose a Payment Method (as the instructions to the shopper say on Step 2 in the gift cert instruction-to-shopper box), so long as you apply enough gift funds to cover the order. Maybe this was an improvement in the ZC code, but the instructions in that box weren't updated?

Along the same lines, if you don't apply a high enough amount of gift cert funds, the red flag fires, but it only says to enter Payment Method, but of course applying a high enough gift fund amount is also sufficient to get on through to Step 3.

probably just remnants of earlier versions of ZC?

thank you for your confirmation about the green flag.