Your Store Gift Cards (plastic, etc) - not working yet?

[TheGardenBath]

Hello!

I'm new here to the forums, but have been reading like mad and using the helpful tips to configure my install and so far I'm LOVING zen cart!
This particular contribution looks really great too! http://www.zen-cart.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=718

I've installed a few contributions so far and had no problems, but I've just downloaded this one - Your Store Gift Cards (plastic, etc) - which was just added to the downloads section on 5/26/08 and am having some issues.

I didn't see a support thread for this yet and if I've violated some rules or etiquette about this, feel free to flog me for it! lol

I've also sent an e-mail detailing all this to the creator, but until I hear back, I thought I'd see if there's a solution. I'll also repost when I get a response, of course.

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When I was on step "C" of the directions (Login to the admin panel and navigate to Modules->Order Total and click on the new giftcard module.):

When I clicked on order totals, I did not see the new gift card module, but instead had this error right above the list of modules:

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_STRING, expecting T_OLD_FUNCTION or T_FUNCTION or T_VAR or '}' in /includes/modules/order_total/ot_giftcard.php on line 62

I'm still feeling my way around php, but I rock at internet searches, so I found a way to correct the code (I think!)
---------------------------------
I had to change line 62 from this:

public $title;

to this:

var $public_title;

----------------------------------
and line 69 from this:

public $output;

to this:

var $public_output;

----------------------------------

After making those changes to those 2 lines, the module was visible in the order totals section and I installed it, leaving all information at the defaults (as recommended per the installation instructions).

Then, continuing on, I reached step "F" of the directions (Now navigate to Tools->Gift Card Manager to begin inserting gift card numbers and settings specific to individual cards. This is also where you activate, lock, and edit card-specific settings.), but when I clicked on Tools->Gift Card Manager, I saw this error above the mostly blank page:

1146 Table 'xxx.giftcards' doesn't exist in: [select count(*) as total from giftcards] If you were entering information, press the BACK button in your browser and re-check the information you had entered to be sure you left no blank fields. (I've removed my database name from the above and replaced it with the "xxx" for security reasons)

There is a row of what looks like headers for the gift cards (gift card code - gift card face value, etc.) but nothing else and no buttons or anything.

The other contributions I've used had sql patches to apply, so I'm wondering if a file was missing maybe?

Any advice? Thanks in advance!!

[nzinni]

Gardenbath,

I was able to re-create the errors you encountered and repaired the bug that was preventing the db table from installing. I also submitted an updated version (1.1 - 6pm CDT) that should be available on the download page within a day or so.

Also included is a changelog.txt file that shows the file structure for easier debugging on your system.

Although I did not recieve your email, thank you for posting this bug and bringing it to my attention.

Please note however, that changing the names of the variables will break (as in your post) the script that your customers access on their checkout page unless you rename all occurences of these variables throughout the script.

Best regards,

T Zinni

[TheGardenBath]

Wow, that's fantastic news and terrific turnaround too! Thank you so much for your efforts!

I'll keep an eye out for the update and re-download and do a fresh install - I'm sure that will do the trick. I'll be sure to keep you posted if I run into any issues, of course.

Thanks again!

[nev]

I’ve been considering using pre-printed Gift Cards since I can have them made inexpensively, but till now it was complicated to do so easily, to so this sound really interesting.

Could you just clarify something for me, from looking through the Readme file I’m trying to understand if these numbers are completely separate from the now existing GV’s or if you just added the functionality to add the card number, amount, activation manually.

Ref:
Allow assignment of card to a particular customer (defeats purpose of "gift") - although you may use initial order # to track purchaser

Would this mean that if a customer A buys a card for customer B , the store issues it, ships it, and then customer B registers on the site he cannot enter the gift card number in the redeem GV and add it to his/her account?

And would this:
“A text box group is displayed on the checkout page just below the coupon group”
Mean that there is one more gift card text box with the module? Or is it using the existing one?

Thanks
nev

[nzinni]

nev,

This module does not interact with the gift voucher/certificate modules of zen-cart as those are for virtual "coupons". They operate by creating a virtual card, emailing the number or virtual certificate to the customer, and then tying those to the customers account.

I offer plastic gift cards with pre-printed numbers on them (like you would purchase at Wal-Mart, Target, etc.) that customers can purchase from my brick-and-mortar store and give to friends or relatives as gifts to later make purchases only at my store. I needed to extend this functionality to my website to extend my customer base but neither zen-cart, oscommerce, or similar shopping cart systems offered this ability, so I created it and released the code as so many other merchants posted similar scenarios.

To address your questions specifically:

1. "I’ve been considering using pre-printed Gift Cards since I can have them made inexpensively" - this module will allow you to do exactly this.

2. "I’m trying to understand if these numbers are completely separate from the now existing GV’s " - yes.

3. "if you just added the functionality to add the card number, amount, activation manually" - yes. The card information is stored in a new database table completely separate from other zen-cart information. You can find the table in your database as "giftcards".

4. "Allow assignment of card to a particular customer (defeats purpose of "gift") - although you may use initial order # to track purchaser

Would this mean that if a customer A buys a card for customer B , the store issues it, ships it, and then customer B registers on the site he cannot enter the gift card number in the redeem GV and add it to his/her account? " - No.
The card number is not bound to the purchaser. The card is tracked by its card number where the card number is the account number. For example, Aunt Betty buys two gift cards on your website and plans to give one to her neice Susie and keep the other for herself. At this point, Aunt Betty's invoice will show she purchased two gift cards but no numbers will be issued. Next you choose two cards from your stock, login to the Gift Card Manager and activate the two numbers, then ship the cards to Aunt Betty.
Aunt Betty gives one away but decides to make another purchase with the card she kept. When she reaches the checkout page, there will be a new entry box that allows her to enter a gift card number. She types in the number and the page will then check that the card exists in your database, that it has been activated, and retrieve the account balance (in the background - not visually) that may be applied to her order. After she confirms her order, the card account is debited and is reflected on her invoice where the card number is masked.
Now when Susie uses her card, she follows the same process. Aunt Betty never sees the information from Susie's transaction, nor does she have access to it.

5. "“A text box group is displayed on the checkout page just below the coupon group”
Mean that there is one more gift card text box with the module? Or is it using the existing one?" - a new (and separate) entry box is provided for these gift cards.

Hope this information helps.

T Zinni

[TheGardenBath]

***just a note - hope you don't mind the long, detailed post...I tend to be a bit retentive! Hopefully these notes will help everyone else though!***

OK, for all those interested, I forgot to add the link yesterday. It has already been updated, so you can get it here:

http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?ma...oducts_id=1024

I downloaded and did a fresh install. I found that I still had to make these changes as I noted in my original post - to the file includes/modules/order_total/ot_giftcard.php:

line 62 from this:

public $title;

to this:

var $public_title;

----------------------------------
line 69 from this:

public $output;

to this:

var $public_output;

...otherwise the module doesn't show up in your admin panel to install at all (modules - order total) and the error shows up as I noted in the first post.

After making the changes to these 2 lines and making NO other changes, the module shows up available for install, which I did.

Now, I went to tools - gift card manager and it appears to be fully functional now, so the OTHER updates that were made fixed the database problem.


This will be an AMAZING contribution - one that will (hopefully) allow me to avoid gift certificates altogether!! As much as I love Zen Cart, I HATE the gift certificate system! lol

My next post will be my testing results...

[TheGardenBath]

OK, the updated files are available for download and so I've done that and done a re-install.

After re-uploading all the new files, I still go the same error I had in my first post in admin --> modules --> order total and so I still had to change the following lines in the file includes/modules/order_total/ot_giftcard.php:

line 62 from this:

public $title;

to this:

var $public_title;

----------------------------------
line 69 from this:

public $output;

to this:

var $public_output;

-----------------------------------------------------------
After doing that, I was able to install the module, just as in my first post. This time, however, when I went to admin --> tools --> gift card manager - everything's working just fine! So, the updates that were made to the database did the trick!

I made NO OTHER changes to the files, but without making those changes noted above, I could not install the module. Please note, that if you have this same issue I did (see post #1), then try this and it should work!


-----------------------------------------------------------
Thanks so much to nzinni for the quick response time on the bug and what I know will be a great mod!

I've pulled out a gift card to use as a tester, so my next post will be all my test results. :)

[TheGardenBath]

OK, I'm THRILLED with this contribution, everything's working just as it should! Here are my notes (sorry this is a bit long - I tend to be retentive, but I'm hoping my notes will help others!)


----------------------------------------------------------
TESTING

There aren't instructions on how exactly to use the module once it's installed, but it seems pretty self-explanatory.


SETUP CARD IN SYSTEM
Still in your admin screen --> tools --> gift card manager

1. You have to create a gift card in the system by clicking on the "insert" button. You then enter the gift card code from the back (or wherever it shows up on your card), the dollar value of the card, and you have the option of applying a zone restriction (which I did not). To finish, click the "insert" button.

If it worked, you'll see this message at the top of your admin screen: Gift Card Successfully Created! This gift card was successfully created.

2. VERY IMPORTANT! You now need to unlock the card for use by the customer or your customer will get an error message while checking out (ask me how I know! lol). To do this, just select the gift card you just created and click the "unlock" button. The next screen will ask you to enter the "sold on order #" - enter the order # where you actually sold the gift card to someone (I had to make one up as I hadn't actually sold this yet and it seems to work). To finish, click the "unlock" button.

It the card is activated, you'll see this message at the top of your admin screen: Activation Successful! This gift card was successfully activated.




REDEMPTION OF CARD BY CUSTOMER
Now I'm going to log-in as a test customer, add an item to my cart (I did 2 tests - one order with an item that was less expensive than my gift card total and one that was more than the gift card total).

1. Go to checkout as normal and on the "payment method" screen, there's a nice boxed section right under the discount coupon section:



2. Enter gift card in box as requested. ALSO, per the contribution notes, your customer MUST select a payment method besides the gift card, even if the gift card will pay for the entire order. Maybe a little tweaking may be in order to show this message to the customer - I'll try that later. Anyway, entered gift card and checked the payment method "check / money order" and finished checkout just fine.

***NOTES***
When I went to "my account" as the customer right after placing the orders and viewed the orders, I could see that the gift card paid for the order (whether entirely or partially).




UPDATE BALANCE OF CARD - done automatically
Back in your admin screen --> tools - gift card manager , I was thrilled to see that the gift card balance was now reduced by the order, all automatically!

-------------------------------------------

***SETTINGS***

One of the options you can change is whether the gift card numbers are "masked" like credit cards are - ex. default is set to mask and show only the last 4 numbers of the gift card.

On your admin screen --> modules - order total, click on the gift card module you can change this:

Reveal # Char (-1 = all)
The number of card number digits revealed on invoice


Mask Char
Set the printed character used to mask digits


Mask Digits
Mask card number digits on customer invoice.

true
false

There are also several other options:

• to set up taxes (include, recalculate, tax class, add tax to gift card when purchased)
  
• to determine whether the gift card pays for shipping or not
  
• to choose the order status for orders made where Gift Card covers full payment (pending, processing, etc)

-----------------------------------

***OTHER GIFT CARD TOOLS***

In your admin --> tools - gift card manager, there are several other things you can do with the gift cards:

• lock - this deactivates the card and it removes all other options, so don't do this unless you really mean it. If you needed to reactivate that particular card, you may be able to add it again - I haven't tested this.
  
• reset - you can add more money to the gift card - only up to the gift card original face value.
  
• price manager - you can actually update the face value of the card. Would be good if you already sold a card to a customer and they want to add more money - you won't have to send them another card, just update the one they currently have.

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***SUMMARY***

Absolutely AMAZING contribution!!!

I love Zen Cart, but really can't stand the gift certificate system (sorry, guys) - it's too clumsy and there are too many potential confusing issues for the customer. Now I can just do regular gift cards and all my issues are resolved!

A huge big thanks to T Zinni for this contribution (I'll send a more useful thank you soon $$$)!

[nev]

T Zinni,

Thanks for the explanation. I was trying to understand how it worked and interacted with the rest, and this helped.

Well since this stated here I guess I’ll continue here.

the zen cart GV doesn't have to be e-mailed to the customer and tied to the customer account.

Ok example what I did this last Christmas:

We were doing some live person to person sales promos for the holiday season.

I wanted to be able to offer Gift Cards as a product for sale and also to give clients that purchased over a certain amount a 10$ store gift card as a gift/bonus, redeemable on the site. Those gifts had the additional purpose to bring clients that purchased from us in person to the online store. Great idea, pain in the to do.

Since the option to input physical gift cards didn’t exist at the time. (your mod now ) What I did was use the Mail Gift Certificate option in the admin to e-mail a certain amount of 10$ cards to the admin, and a certain amount of other pre determined values 25, 50, 100.

I then had those numbers that came in the e-mail to the admin, printed on the cards with the amounts.

It's a pain to do it this way. But at the time it was the only option. Additionally, all the cards that I had with me, had to be kept secure like cash since they were already issued and only needed to be redeemed.

However those GV numbers are not assigned to a particular customer until used/redeemed, they sit in the gift card sent list as not redeemed.

Anyone who has the right GV code in their hand, whether it’s the customer I sold it to or whoever they gave it to can/did use them.

So the present GV set up can handle those unassigned cards numbers. What it can’t handle from the admin is the manual input of the GV number.

When I started looking into having the cards with numbers pre-printed, to avoid possible conflict with online issued cards I was going to have them with 2 extra digits then the e-cards, I realized that the only way to get a preprinted number to “work” was to issue the GV in the right amount to the admin again, then use phpMyAdmin to change the GV number in the table to the one already on the card. In short possible but too complicated.

However, the “only” thing that is really needed to make this work elegantly from the admin stand point is the admin interface with the present GV’s.

A place where instead of sending a GV with an e-mail to the admin, you can take a preprinted card, enter the amount and card number, and “activate” it.

Once the client has the card they can redeem the card using the same GV module, (assigning it to their account before hand or at the point of purchase) without a need for 2 entry fields for Gift Cards on the check out page.

By the same principle you can sell these preprinted cards online under a different product code then GIFT, so as a physical product. There would be no e-mail to the customer and the card number/amount would only be “assigned” to the final recipient.

This would also make 2 things possible, they would be able to know the balance of their Gift Card in the My Accounts and since the present GV is already set up it would solve the “issue” of needing an alternate method of payment even if the Gift Card amount is enough.

I know the module is done as is already, and you probably have it working on your store just as you like it and I DO appreciate it, since it does give me an option to add something I wanted to the store. So don’t bite for the above, it’s just a thought. To make it simpler for the customer and for the 2 to work as one, for anyone who wants/needs to use both. E-cards are great for last minute emergencies.

just a though
nev

[TheGardenBath]

Great idea to combine the modules in use like that, nev!

I'm actually wondering if there isn't a way to create your own gift card codes that could be e-mailed to customers and still redeemed using this great mod.

I know there's software out there that generates the card numbers for the companies who create & print the plastic gift cards, so why couldn't we find some software and create our own codes...then e-mail the unique code to the customer and have them redeem the "virtual" gift card using this mod?

I've seen password generators and license generators, so there must be a software to make random codes like this, right?

I may look into this idea more, but would there be any downsides or security risks to this that I just can't think of?