Some questions from my client?

Hi! My client has posed the following questions and I am not certain of the answers. Would you mind clarifying for me.

Will the site send a confirmation to those ordering?
Does it send the order to my email?
As the details may change on the day can I change the invoice, I'm presuming an invoice will be created, before payment goes through? This is important because I don't always get everything that I have ordered.

I'm pretty sure the answer to the first two is yes and I know you can check your orders through the admin but I wasn't sure whether it sent an email to the owner of the store.

With regard to the third question the answer would be no .. shopper purchases and order is a done deal with payment made? It would be up to store owner to check stock levels on website yes?

And last store owner wants to know whether products can be added without an image and not have no picture available.

Thanks for your time everyone. You are all AWESOME!:clap:

Will the site send a confirmation to those ordering?
YES

Does it send the order to my email?
YES - you configure this in admin >>> configuration >>> email settings

As the details may change on the day can I change the invoice, I'm presuming an invoice will be created, before payment goes through? This is important because I don't always get everything that I have ordered.
NOT native behaviour, but orders CAN be edited after installing the following:-
http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?main_page=product_contrib_info&products_id=1818

The only effective way to prevent shoppers from ordering items that are not in stock, is to use the stock management systems in zencart.

Generally, if an item can be added to cart, and checkout is done, customer will pay for whatever is in the cart - even if the product is not in stock, and the store owner has set stock management to allow chackout on zero stock.

Thanks for your response. I have had further meeting with client and this is the scenario she wants as her position is such that she cannot always supply goods that are on the website due to short notice deliveries of her organic produce.

She does not want to use the stock levels feature of zen cart. She will remove permanently any stock that goes out of season. She wants customer to be able to put produce in shopping cart, an order confirmation sent to her and client. Customer to store credit card details on line and once order is filled by her, payment is processed.
She also wants to be able to take products out of order .. if stock not available.

Is this all possible? Thanks

wotnow:

Thanks for your response. I have had further meeting with client and this is the scenario she wants as her position is such that she cannot always supply goods that are on the website due to short notice deliveries of her organic produce.

She does not want to use the stock levels feature of zen cart. She will remove permanently any stock that goes out of season. She wants customer to be able to put produce in shopping cart, an order confirmation sent to her and client. Customer to store credit card details on line and once order is filled by her, payment is processed.
She also wants to be able to take products out of order .. if stock not available.

Is this all possible? Thanks

She can't have the "best of both worlds"... Credit card Payment Gateways are generally configured to take payments in "real time", and zencart (as will all other eComm platforms), simply add up what's in the shopping cart, and send the total off to the payment processor.

"Storing" credit card information is extremely complicated and requires that the merchant complies with the stringent requirements of PCI/DSS . You would do well to research what PCI/DSS means, and what it may cost to set up.

The only solution I can see for you is that she does not take realtime" card payments, and that all orders coming in are manually checked. If they need products removed, then this is done prior to the order being processed. When the order is correct, the payment request is passed to the payment processor. This may also have to be a manual exercise, where an invoice is sent to the customer.

Thanks once again for your input. Client is ok with manually checking every order and then changing and pass payment request on. She can put the invoice in with the goods for delivery.

I have no idea how to configure this. Do I install Super Orders 3.0 or Edit Orders 3.0 or both. Have never built a site with zen cart where payment is not processed in real time.

To build a facility that does this in an "automated" way, will be very challenging and costly.

To keep costs down, your client will have to examine "manual" methods of payment processing.

As mentioned, to collect credit card data for what are known as CNP payments, the web-server needs to be PCS/DSS compliant, and the manner in which the system collects card data also needs to be built with high-grade security and encryption in mind. Banks will have it no other way, and for very good reason...

So... unless your client has several thousand dollars to devote to this process, your options will be to put in place manual methods.

One way to do this is to use the CHECK/MONEYORDER module to at least gather all the order information, process it through zencart, and deliver the data to the database.

The CHECK/MONEYORDER module can be "cloned" and customised in a way that indicates to the customer that their order has been received, and will be reviewed, and that they will be sent an invoice with the final details and amount due.

The invoice (or email) can contain your client's PayPal email address, (or maybe even a paypal Pay-Now button) and that is how the customer will pay.

It is workable, but VERY clunky, and internet shoppers don't like such cumbersome procedures... People are used to simple "one-click" payment processing. SO... you must also take into account the likelihood of customers saying...

"This is nonsense... To buy your products is a huge effort and mission... I'm going to shop somewhere else where its easier and faster..."

Research shows that up to 80% of shopping carts are abandoned if the payment procedure is not efficient and streamlined.

In your client's case, this abandonment rate could be much higher - and if it is 100%, then the whole point of having a webshop becomes pointless...

Thanks so much for explaining this to me .. I felt like I was getting way over my head. I have only used zen cart twice and that was some time ago now. Client is only targeting local buyers (small town) and simply wants customers to put in an order which gets sent to her with a copy to customer. I am not sure how this next part is to work but she wants to be able to edit the order if stock has not arrived to her. Is this part anything to do with zen cart?

Once the order is filled I guess that is the end of zen carts function, if she has to process payments through another way eg bank account details or like you suggest a paypal Pay Now Button.

How does one go about inserting a Pay Now Button on Zen carts confirmation email? :cry:

Also she has purchased and I have installed SSL certificate. Is this necessary now?

Site still being developed http://www.fusionherbsorganics.com.au/

I know I am still having issues with the damn right sidebox.

SSL is always good... it inspires confidence in web-shoppers. Every eComm site should have dedicated SSL - even if payments are being processed by a remote gateway (such as paypal).

If the orders are to be "reviewed" and possibly altered, then you need to install http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?main_page=product_contrib_info&products_id=1818 .

Next, the system needs to be able to process an order, and deliver the data to the database, so it will need a payment module.

As I suggested, the CHECK/MONEYORDER module can be "cloned" (a copy made of the module), so that all the wording is altered to reflect what happens when an order is received, and what will happen regarding payment.

I created a CLONE of Check/MoneyOrder some years ago and called it Account Holders.

Perhaps you should go get a copy of it, see how it is different from the Check/Moneyorders standard module, and then look at creating your own "clone"... It's not difficult, but you need to pay attention to detail. http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?main_page=product_contrib_info&products_id=511

As far as finally advising the customers of their ACTUAL order, and how they must pay... there are several ways to do this, but discussing them in detail is not something I have time for.

Basically, when the customer is sent the final invoice, this needs to provide the paypal email address that they must go to in order to pay, and must also tell them to enter the order number or some other reference, so that the site owner can reconcile payment with an order.

Thanks for all your time here .. very much appreciated. I will have a look at the modules you suggested. Once that module is inserted is that the end of the process or do I need to install either Super Orders 3.0 or Edit Orders 3.0 or both?