back ordering and then debit credit card when back order product come back into stock

[cem1]

I know this part is possible:
When a user tries to add a product to the cart, system needs to check inventory and if inventory is zero, needs to display the message to the user "This product is currently out of stock and will be shipped in 2-3 weeks".

But I do not know if zen cart supports this feature or if there is an add-on which does following:
It will also add the item to back order list for the customer and not charge for it until there is inventory in stock. (need to see how zencart handles these situations out of the box and do it the same way).

[philip937]

I know this part is possible:
When a user tries to add a product to the cart, system needs to check inventory and if inventory is zero, needs to display the message to the user "This product is currently out of stock and will be shipped in 2-3 weeks".

But I do not know if zen cart supports this feature or if there is an add-on which does following:
It will also add the item to back order list for the customer and not charge for it until there is inventory in stock. (need to see how zencart handles these situations out of the box and do it the same way).

as far as i'm aware you can allow checkout for items that are out of stock, so you could just have a standard message advising items will be dispatched when back in stock.

I doubt without some seiolus custom coding you would be able to show individual expected dates for products, though having said that the code exists because you can display expected products listing on a category view and I guess that is simply pulling product details based on that category id.. so you could maybe use the same code in the shopping cart and instead of checking category, check the product id's in cart..

of course also depends if you have a mod like stock by attributes which could complicate things further.

[philip937]

also with regard to only charging after its back in stock, perhaps you could make a discount module that makes a product free if the stock is 0?

[philip937]

and then on the 'discount' line you could call it something like,

for example
Backorder Items Amount Outstanding: £-133.43

[DrByte]

Zen Cart is primarily geared around collecting full payment up-front for all purchases. The only exception to that is where the selected payment choice requires a delay such as waiting for a check/money-order to arrive, or COD, etc.

Some stores set their credit-card module into "authorize-only" mode so that cards are not actually charged until the administrator manually captures the payment. This is typical for sellers whose fulfillment can't happen until products are actually assembled or built to specifications and therefore not shipped within a day or two of the order being placed.

To change things to selectively set a purchase to authorize-only only under "certain conditions" would require some custom rewriting of code. It gets even more complicated if you intend to collect partial payments in multiple stages such as if the customer is buying 3 items and only 2 are on backorder. What's even more challenging is if you then needed to charge shipping multiple times, since that's not a built-in option presently.