paypal pament received but no order in Zencart

[ideasco]

I received a PayPal payment from an online order. When I log into PayPal I can see a Zenid for the transaction. However, there is no record of it in my Zencart.
I called the customer and they confirmed that they had placed an order.

I would like to know how that could happen. Any insight would be appreciated.

[DrByte]

That happens when you're using PayPal's older "IPN" method of enabling orders. In such cases, if there's ANY problem with PayPal's server contacting *your* server to tell it about the new order, your store will never see it.

Options:
a) use the more reliable Express Checkout option instead http://www.zen-cart.com/getpaypal
b) fix all the myriad possible communications problems including your own configuration settings. Much troubleshooting guidance is listed here: http://www.zen-cart.com/wiki/index.php/PayPal
c) either way, make sure you're using the latest version of Zen Cart, since it will include fixes to many known fixable issues

[ideasco]

Thanks very much for your quick reply.
I did follow up with much of the advice you gave.

I performed purchases with and without Paypal account. Worked fine in both cases.

I switched on Paypal Debug and set to 777.

I installed the ipncheck.php (www.newportgeographic.com/ipncheck.php). and it seems to indicate that there is no problem with the non ssl method.

BTW, I have noticed that when that customer has been online (for the order and then the re-order) that my sitemeter.com visitor tracking did not register/record his visit to the site. I found that strange. Any comments?

Thanks for the help

[DrByte]

I installed the ipncheck.php (www.newportgeographic.com/ipncheck.php). and it seems to indicate that there is no problem with the non ssl method.

And that test ONLY proves that IF your store receives an incoming IPN notice from Paypal that the communications to send it BACK to PayPal for verification is open.

BTW, I have noticed that when that customer has been online (for the order and then the re-order) that my sitemeter.com visitor tracking did not register/record his visit to the site. I found that strange. Any comments?

I can't speak to that since I don't know how you've set it up, and seems unrelated to the matter of payments being received.
I can say that if you're relying on something to happen with your visitor-tracking *after* the customer clicks Confirm on the checkout_confirmation screen, that your tracking results will be skewed if you're using the IPN/Standard module. However, using Express Checkout the results will be more consistent.

[ideasco]

The tracking should record ALL site visits, no matter where they land, so it is mighty strange.

Am I correct in saying that, since I switched on error logging for PayPal, and that since ipncheck indicates no problem, that I can only wait until, and if, that problem ever occurs again and then to look at the error log.

Thanks again

[DrByte]

Let me say it again another way: Using the old IPN/Standard module, you're going to have inconsistent results with any analytics tools because customers won't always come back to your site after completing payment, and sometimes may not even properly send the order notice TO your site, esp if they don't already have a PayPal account, simply because PayPal stops and asks them to create an account before sending the customer back to your site. If the customer closes the browser or doesn't click a choice, then they won't come back to your store and thus won't trigger your analytics monitors.
Also, if you're hooking into the order-creation step for any of your analytics, you'll see that the IP address of the order actually shows as PayPal's address, and not your customer's address, thus throwing off any analytics you're doing based on IP address (which is a very common method of tracking visitor activity).
Using Express Checkout avoids these issues because it's architected in a more modern way which keeps things consistent in the overall checkout flow.

I'm not sure what you're looking for in the error log.

[ideasco]

First, Thanks again for helping me out.
Maybe I misunderstood something fundamental.
When a customer pays in Paypal the customer is returned to the site and ONLY then does the order appear in my Zencart shopping cart. Now I believe that you said that for some reason it does not always return, and therefore there is no record of the order, though the payment was made. That seems so strange, since the order was initiated in my shopping cart and i thought that there would be at least an unconfirmed record there. If that is true then I am very surprised that such a process flow with such an obvious flaw exists. (I hope I am not mis-representing it).
I have received many orders from that customer over two years and we never had that error before.
Just to confirm then... is the old IPN/Standard module susceptible to this type of issue (though infrequent) where the only solution is to implement the Express Checkout ? (Apologies for seeming so redundant).

Please advise regarding the Express Checkout: It requires that I implement SSL and that transaction costs with Paypal will be more expensive. Is that about right?

My "sitemeter" tracks visitors from the moment they land on any page of the site, not just after they purchase something. It appeared to work well and I have not changed the code recently, yet the visits associated with the erroneous order and the subsequent replacement order were not recorded. That is a bit of a mystery.

Regarding the error log: I thought that it would help trace the type of paypal related error that I had, as it was listed as one of the possible tools to help resolve the problem. If that is not the case then I am not still sure what errors it would track.

As you can see, I am not all that knowledgeable in Zencart so i apologize if some of this stuff should be obvious.

[DrByte]

When a customer pays in Paypal the customer is returned to the site and ONLY then does the order appear in my Zencart shopping cart. Now I believe that you said that for some reason it does not always return,

Correct: if you're using Website Payments Standard and the customer doesn't have a PayPal account, then PayPal will ask them at the end of payment whether they'd like to create an account. They have to choose yes or no. Until they make a choice, they are NOT returned to your site.

and therefore there is no record of the order, though the payment was made. That seems so strange, since the order was initiated in my shopping cart and i thought that there would be at least an unconfirmed record there. If that is true then I am very surprised that such a process flow with such an obvious flaw exists.

I hate it too, but it's completely in the hands of PayPal, and I've been complaining to them for years about it.

Just to confirm then... is the old IPN/Standard module susceptible to this type of issue (though infrequent) where the only solution is to implement the Express Checkout ?

The best solution is to implement Express Checkout.

Please advise regarding the Express Checkout: It requires that I implement SSL and that transaction costs with Paypal will be more expensive. Is that about right?

No. Express Checkout doesn't have any SSL requirements. And the cost is the same as Standard.

[ideasco]

Thanks very much for all your help

[jgills]

Could we revisit this issue? I had a similar problem on a website i worked on and switched to Express Checkout but the problem still happens seemingly about once a month.

Does no one else experience this problem with Express Checkout?