Dwolla Payments module

**mmwilcox** · 9 Dec 2010, 04:18 PM

Does anyone know how to create/ integrate a Dwolla payments module? (Dwolla: U.S. based system which offers electronic payments for $0.25/ transaction vs. 3%+ for paypal).

**rousseau** · 12 Mar 2011, 02:24 AM

mmwilcox,

Dwolla is something I just learned about by accident a couple weeks ago - they are here in Des Moines even! So not being much of a programmer, but a zen cart user (must have some programming skills for customizing ZC, right?) I went to one of their meetup events and was very impressed.

Anyway it looks like a fantastic service that will doubtless take off b/c of the awesome fee structure and ease of use.

Anyway, I'm 99% sure that I've successfully ported the oscommerce module to Zen Cart using the ZC wiki article on porting modules from osc.

Maybe this weekend I'll find out more. I just want you to know someone is working on it and I may be posting it soon.

John

**mmwilcox** · 14 Mar 2011, 07:10 PM

Thanks John. I look forward to seeing it.

I'd like to offer a discount of 1 or 2% for using Dwolla. Its still less than the credit charges we pay. Anyway, being a remedial programmer, I was able to modiffy the Dwolla setup to allow the admin to set a discount amount. Then, when checking out, it would calculate the discount and net amounts and feed those to the Dwolla Hub for the user.

It worked perfectly except when a coupon was used. I was unable to grab the after-coupon total to determine the appropriate discount and net payment amount.

I would be happy to share what i've done thus far if you are interested in the discount feature.

Thanks,

**rousseau** · 15 Mar 2011, 05:09 PM

Here it is. Okay it won't allow me to upload the files b/c they exceed the maximum.

I tested it and found it works with my version 1.3.9fp1.

It requires you to check your email and enter the random code that was emailed to you to complete the checkout. (I kept entering my Dwolla PIN number and it kept rejecting the transaction at first.)

Yes I'm interested in having the price discounted by 2% or something when users choose this method of checkout, but I really don't know where to start on coding this. Maybe in the 'orders.php' file? If you know anything more then I'd be interested in your approach.

Thanks!

John

**rousseau** · 15 Mar 2011, 05:24 PM

Here it is.

EDIT:
(Okay it won't allow me to upload the files b/c they exceed the maximum. So I uploaded the files I could as "languages.zip" and "modules.zip". These have the 2 files that need to be put in the "includes" folder while retaining the file structure. For this module to work it also needs the xml/SOAP library in the "includes/modules/payment/lib" folder, which can be downloaded here: http://addons.oscommerce.com/info/7732.
Extract the files, then only use the xml library "includes/modules/payment/lib")

Hint: There is one other thing to consider with this type module is that it is using SOAP so you may have to have your web host enable SOAP on your web server.

I tested this and found it works with my version 1.3.9fp1.

It requires you to check your email and enter the random code that was emailed to you to complete the checkout. (I kept entering my Dwolla PIN number and it kept rejecting the transaction at first.)

Yes I'm interested in having the price discounted by 2% or something when users choose this method of checkout, but I really don't know where to start on coding this. Maybe in the 'orders.php' file? If you know anything more then I'd be interested in your approach.

Thanks!

John

**mmwilcox** · 15 Mar 2011, 06:58 PM

Thanks and nice work.

Here are the two files that I worked on to create a percentage discount. Perhaps there are some pieces that you or someone will find helpful.

Good luck.

**rousseau** · 21 Mar 2011, 07:28 PM

@mmwilcox:
I just wanted to say I forgot to mention that there is an edit to the 'dwolla.php' file that's in the "includes/languages/english(and/or other language name here)/modules/payment/" folder that needs to be made before it will work.

On this line:
define('MODULE_PAYMENT_DWOLLA_ACCOUNT_ID', 'Dwolla Account ID (xxx-xxx-xxxx):');

It needs your actual Dwolla id where the xxx-xxx-xxxx is and you'll be set.

Regarding your files. That's great that you got it this far. I'm curious what you used as a template to get started writing this module?

I don't know why the coupons would cause a problem, but you've got to be close if that's the only issue. Somehow I keep thinking I saw code for this stuff (how order calculations are done, in what order, etc.) in the orders.php file a long time ago when I was diagnosing another issue. But maybe it would need to be an 'if...then' statement in the dwolla.php file that checked if there is a coupon being used, then applying the coupon. I dunno.

I don't really have time at the moment to look into it further until my other work slows down, but I plan to look at the discount thing some more because I really think this is the key to getting customers to use Dwolla on our site because otherwise people are more willing to use their credit cards with cash back type incentives.

A few more things I found out about Dwolla:

You have to move the money manually into your Dwolla account before making a purchase and it can take 2-3 days for the transfer to take place. (big downside)
And as a business account (free upgrade) you can move $10,000 at a time as a maximum or $5,000 max per purchase if you have a personal account (free). (very good, b/c even a $50,000 purchase only costs $1.25 with 5 transactions!)

Thanks for sharing what you've done,
John

**Jeff12671** · 17 Apr 2011, 10:54 PM

Hi, I got John's version working fine. I'm trying to understand this correctly on how to add in the discount functionality Matt has developed. Do his files need to be somehow integrated into or added with John's module files to provide the discount functionality? I assume that's the case. Thanks very much to both of you guys working on these, I'm a big Dwolla supporter and I really appreciate your taking the time to develop these modules.

Thanks, Jeff

**rousseau** · 18 Apr 2011, 03:12 PM

Jeff,
Matt and I came at this module from different angles. I took an existing OS Commerce module and converted it to Zen Cart. (I don't know how Matt came up with his module.)

The one I converted doesn't have the discount feature in it, but I posted it for distribution because even though it would be nice, it's not critical for the module to work. So I thought it would be good to let others use it and get on board with accepting Dwolla on their Zen Cart stores right away.

Regarding the discount for using Dwolla - Matt does have much of it done it looks like, but I personally haven't tried it or tried integrating the two. I welcome anyone to try and get it working as I do not have so much time to devote to this right now.

Dwolla has a lot of upside potential, and giving people incentives to using it is probably the best way to realize this - so it's probably one of the most important features to add to this module. I welcome anyone to volunteer their skills to make this happen.

John

**mmwilcox** · 20 Apr 2011, 08:03 PM

Thanks John and Jeff for the feedback and interest. My modules came from converting/ modifying the code from the "Invoice" module that is available for download. It is much like all of the simpler payment modules and provided the basic structure for the installation and other routines.

John, Dwolla sort of put this into prime time with their website link and email distribution. Hopefully, someone (maybe someone at Dwolla? hint hint) will be motivated to lend guidance towards getting the coupon incorporation to work. It is certainly in Dwolla's best interest.

Thanks.