PayPal Instant Payment Notification Warnings suddenly

I have been running Zen Cart 1.3.9h for 5 or 6 months now on Linux Server at HostGator.com with no problems. Starting on Saturday July 2nd i got 2 notices from Paypal with the subject line, "PayPal Instant Payment Notification Warning". I am attaching a ZIP file called PayPal_IPN.zip which contains these emails. Basically the emails say that the "IPNs sent to the following URL(s) are failing". The URL is, http://www.thinkpinkpixels.com/shop/ipn_main_handler.php.

1. The referenced file is in the domain sub-directory referenced.

2. I have run the IPNCHECK.PHP script - Version 1.3.9 with the following output from the script;

IPNCHECK.PHP - Version 1.3.9

IPN TESTING - Response Received via CURL -- COMMUNICATIONS OKAY

IPN TESTING - Confirmation/Validation response with fsockopen(): FSOCKOPEN() RESPONSE RECEIVED - Communications OKAY

Default method likely to be used for communications is: CURL, with the fallback method being FSOCKOPEN if possible.

Script finished.

3. I also got an email from a customer asking for a refund because of a "Double order" she says was made on the evening that one of the emails from PayPal references, Saturday July 2nd. I found no double order.

4. I looked at the log files that PayPal IPN's generate. These are also included in the PayPal_IPN.zip file attached to this post. They appear 'normal'.

My conclusion at this point is that for whatever reason my leased server is 'loosing visibility' to the internet occasionally. The loss of visibility happened during a transaction once and a second time but the second time visibility came back in time for the transaction to appear normal to the customer.

Having said that could something else be causing the 'IPN failure"?

Prior to these mails from PayPal everything was running fine. Except for these 2 mails everything right now seems o.k. The other thing that is strange is that these 2 events occurred within 1 minute of each other 24 hours apart. Look at the date/time the emails were sent from PayPal.

BTW, I did look thru the FAQ, the Forum & did a pretty extensive Google search before posting this. Since there was no negative output from the IPNCHECK.PHP script I don't have any clues as to where to look. I did compare the .../shop/ipn_main_handler.php file on the server with the one on my local machine and they appear to be the same.

Any ideas about what is going on to cause these emails from PayPal? They, PayPal say that "IPNs may be disabled for your account" if this continues. Needless to say that would be a bad thing.

Thanks in advance...

Are you using PP standard?

Look in your PayPal's "IPN History" screen and find out which IPNs are failing, and what the HTTP-Response they've recorded when those failures happen.
Then compare those failed transactions with the logs/transactions within your store. Is there a match? What was the outcome in the logs?

kobra:

Are you using PP standard?

I am using Express Checkout via the "FREE" PayPal account. I'm only paying a percentage of sales, not a monthly fee. I hope this answers your question.

DrByte:

Look in your PayPal's "IPN History" screen and find out which IPNs are failing, and what the HTTP-Response they've recorded when those failures happen.
Then compare those failed transactions with the logs/transactions within your store. Is there a match? What was the outcome in the logs?

Looks like the 'failure is an HTTP 404 File Not Found. But as I said in my original post the IPN file is where it is supposed to be. I saved the various screens as PDF's if you want to look at them. I don't really want to post to the general public, so let me send you a 'secure' link to download them from, if you need them.

A 404-NOT-FOUND message means: The file could not be found. Sorry if that sounds obvious, but it's true.

If you click the link from your first post above, you'll find that YOU also get the same response. Try it: http://www.thinkpinkpixels.com/shop/ipn_main_handler.php

So, clearly, that file does not exist on your webserver. Or, if it does, then its permissions are so low that PHP/apache doesn't have permission to even know it exists, and thus is responding with a not-found response.

Your problem is not with PayPal. It's with missing files on your site.

Furthermore, the http://www.thinkpinkpixels.com/shop/ folder appears to point to a site that's NOT running Zen Cart.

Maybe you need to figure out which software you plan to use, and stick with that. Running multiple different software apps for the same site is going to confuse not only you but also the external services to which you connect.

Your logs show that your Zen Cart site is running from the /store/ folder, not the /shop/ folder.
Thus, the emails you're receiving from PayPal are a result of you having configured your PayPal account to point to the /shop/ folder for the IPN URL, but you're running transactions against your PayPal account from a DIFFERENT store software system, and THOSE transactions are what's generating the failure emails from PayPal.

Zen Cart is smart enough to send the /store/ path when it submits its transactions, overriding whatever URL you've entered in your PayPal account settings. All other store software apps will use whatever you entered in your PayPal account settings. And, in this case it's those other store softwares that are putting your PayPal account operation in jeopardy, not Zen Cart.

You are correct, the server has 3 different 'stores'. The zen cart runs from the store folder. the other 2 were test installs from way back when I was trying to figure out which one to use. I never deleted the old unused store installs. I just deleted the MySQL DB. What a dumb move on my part... :censored: :oops:

I removed those unused folders and that should clear this up. I just forgot those folders in my 'zeal' of excitement at getting zen up and running...

Thank you all for your help & patience.:blush: