automatic bill pay

[JustinD]

I have been searching through the documentation, and it looks like this can't be done, but I thought I'd ask just in case.

I have an office cleaning business. Invoices are sent out monthly. Some months have more cleaning dates than others, so the total service charge fluctuates even though the per-cleaning charge does not. I also sell products. The sales total fluctuates as well, depending on the amount of supplies used. Customers do not order products themselves, but leave that up to me.

My customers want to enter their credit card one time and let me charge that card automatically each month. Is there a way to facilitate this with Zen Cart? I am using Paypal Web Payments Standard.

[DrByte]

Zen Cart doesn't currently have built-in support for recurring payments, although there are a couple addons that try to create that functionality, albeit with quite limited success.

Given that the price your customers intend to pay each month is going to fluctuate, there will have to be some creative work done to utilize the recurring-payments features offered by PayPal ... and to do that you'd have to also subscribe to their Website Payments Pro product if you intend to charge credit cards on the customers' behalf.

So, while Zen Cart presently has some technical limitations related to handling recurring-charge products, you're also going to find some challenges with your selected payment processor given the business model you're using and your desired "solution".

[afo]

I suppose you could use the mod that allows you to log in as the customer and place the order as if they were doing so. That would give you the correct total (assuming you're listing the services and products on your site) and allow you to check out as the customer in question. Would that work for you? It's not automatic, but it could be a way for you to do what you're asking.

[JustinD]

I suppose you could use the mod that allows you to log in as the customer and place the order as if they were doing so. That would give you the correct total (assuming you're listing the services and products on your site) and allow you to check out as the customer in question. Would that work for you? It's not automatic, but it could be a way for you to do what you're asking.

I think that will work! That's a very good solution. Thank you. (Master Password mod, for anyone who is trying to find it.)

[afo]

It was just a thought. I'm glad it'll work out for you. I thought of it since the amounts may vary, so it's not a straight automatic payment (the same amount every time).



The only catch may be the PayPal side. You'll have to check on that.

[dbltoe]

Would be best if you used the Encrypted Master Password module as the master password module does not encrypt the password either in the admin menu or the database.