Adjusting Foreign Currencies

[johns4y]

www.jaysmodelkits.com
ZC v1.5.7d

Hey guys, I have a question regarding the updating of currencies. With the current turbulent times with the world economies the currencies are changing wildly up and down on a daily basis. For instance, in the last month the USD to NZD has changed by as much a $0.07c in favour of the USD, if I don't keep on top of it I could end up losing out from the conversions.
I have been manually updating the exchange rates using values from my local bank, I would love to use a market rate as given by such websites as XE.com and then apply a suitable adjustment to bring the rates in line with the banks/PayPal. So, it would be cool if, when clicking on the 'Update Exchange Rate' button, it will use the rates from xe.com. But, I have no idea what source(s) the module uses, all I know is that it is widely inaccurate. Again using the USD-NZD as an example, the exchange rate via XE.com is US$0.6412, my local bank has it at US$0.6512. But when I clicked on the button it set the rate as US$0.7036
For AUSD to NZD it had the Aussie dollar being at a greater value than the NZD at over $1! when in fact the AUSD is at $0.9537.

Is there a way to alter the module to point to a specific source? either XE.com or a bank?
Cheers, John.

[dbltoe]

This was an ZC upgrade from a far earlier version.

When running YOUR_SITE/YOUR_ADMIN/currency_cron.php, we get

#!/usr/bin/php ERROR: Permission denied.

No log files are created and the folders are all 755 with files at 644.

More 'splorin' going on.

[OldNGrey]

My site (zc157d ) reports back that the exchange rate is coming from ecb. This is set in admin | configuration | My store | Currency Exchange Rate: Primary Source. There are two options: ecb and boc
Just above that line is Currency Conversion Ratio which gives an uplift ratio that is applied to the exchange rate before it is displayed by admin | Localizations | currencies.
I have my uplift ratio set to 1.025.

To avoid variations in currency exchange payments I allow prices to be displayed in some other currencies eg USD, GBP, CAN, NZD BUT only sell in AUD and let the credit card clearance process determine the final value. I now process all credit cards and debit cards via SecurePay. When I was also using PayPal their exchange rate was often up to 3points off. Now all my currency exchanges are consistent.

There is a clear explanation of this pricing for the customer.

[dbltoe]

THANX for the input. The currencies_cron.php is now properly setup to run daily.

The OP will need to decide where to go next.

[johns4y]

Hmm, where to from here.

[johns4y]

Hmm, where to from here.
Thanks guys. I will have to dig a little deeper as I don't know what eco or boc is. I too have a few foreign currencies which the customer can select to display the item prices in, just the common ones. I also have a uplift ratio applied which helps take care of the PayPal fees. Before I used to have all the payments processed in USD, the default, but have since changed this in PP to NZD. It just made things a little simpler for me not having to exchange currencies in PP and potentially losing money, (or gaining money) depending on which way the currencies go, whilst the money sits their in the PP account.

[dbltoe]

Something I put together that might help.

https://myzencarthost.com/index.php?...-Zen-Cart.html