Gift Certificate direct into account, NO CODES SENT???

GC's are going right into the user account, no codes sent, that is not right or what I what.
I had the wife buy a $2 GC, everything seemed to work ok, I got payment everything, but she never got any code for the GC.
I refunded her $2 and that worked back to Paypal also.
Then she bought a $2 GC again and again NO CODE!
Now her account showed $4 available.

First problem. She never got any kind of codes in E-mail or such, so no way to send that GC to anyone like to our Daughter. That messes up anything like people buying a GC to give as a gift to someone else.

Second problem. I refunded her first purchase of $2 GC but she still had the $2 in her account. Of course that is not good either. If needed how would I cancel a GC amount in a case like this?

Wife was able to buy a $2 GC a third time by using $2 of her account balance, we do not know what is going on with that yet as she can't find a balance status or what ever in her account, but should have either $2 after sale or $4 if the GC went right back into account.
She has not got any emailed codes for any GC's, but she has got a order confirmation for all 3.

When a person buys a Gift Certificate there are no codes ...

If you do not want them to immediately get the GV until you approve it, turn on the GV Queue ...

Go to the Modules ... Order Total ... and edit the Gift Certificate ot_gv and set the:

Queue Purchases
true

OK, I'm confused a bit. Tutorial reads

HOW DOES IT WORK THEN ?
After the Administrator has approved the Gift Certificate (There's a "release" button in admin area if someone buys one), THEN the Gift Certificate funds are made available to the customer.

Upon release/approval, they are sent an email with a redemption code. When they redeem that code either by clicking on the link** or by keying in the code on the checkout-payment page** (or the gv-redemption screen), then the customer will have GV funds available to them for use in that or future transactions.

The customer can then USE those funds for themselves, OR they can email them to friend(s) via the links provided automatically in the store (esp shopping cart sidebox). They can email as much as they want, to various people, up to the amount they've purchased. Whoever they email it to will receive a new redemption code and will follow the same redemption process ... and can email the funds again if they wish.

OK, I'm confused a bit. Tutorial reads

HOW DOES IT WORK THEN ?
After the Administrator has approved the Gift Certificate (There's a "release" button in admin area if someone buys one), THEN the Gift Certificate funds are made available to the customer.

Upon release/approval, they are sent an email with a redemption code. When they redeem that code either by clicking on the link** or by keying in the code on the checkout-payment page** (or the gv-redemption screen), then the customer will have GV funds available to them for use in that or future transactions.

The customer can then USE those funds for themselves, OR they can email them to friend(s) via the links provided automatically in the store (esp shopping cart sidebox). They can email as much as they want, to various people, up to the amount they've purchased. Whoever they email it to will receive a new redemption code and will follow the same redemption process ... and can email the funds again if they wish.

So unless something changed, I read what I put in bold to mean wife should have got an email with a code in it, then she can send that code to our daughter so she can use it.

I don't want to manually approve GC's either, I want to have them go out soon as bought and I receive payment.

Sorry, I tried to edit that first one and the 7 minute timer messed it up, so I had to post the second one.

That FAQ is poorly written ... looks like I have some rewriting to do ...

There are 3 ways to obtain a Gift Certificate:
1 the Admin sends a Gift Certificate to a customer (this has a redemption code)

2 A Customer sends a portion of their own Gift Certificate Balance to another customer or guest (this has a redemption code)

3 A Customer purchases a Gift Certificate (this does NOT have a redemption code)

If a Gift Certificate is emailed by the Admin or from one customer to another customer, there is a redemption code, and when that redemption code is redeemed the amount is then credited to the Customer's GV Balance ...

Or, when a Gift Certificate is purchases by the customer, if the Gift Certificates are set to be queued to confirm payment before the customer obtains the Gift Certificate values in their GV Balance, when the Gift Certificate is released the amount is immediately credited to the Customer's GV Balance ...

The GV Queue is a good idea, as this allows the Admin to ensure that the payment is valid before releasing the Gift Certificate amount to be added to the Customer's account. To utilize the GV Queue, there is a setting in the Modules ... Order Total modules for Gift Certificate ot_gv that can be turned on or off ...

Thanks!
I understand it now!

So basically when the customer buys the GC to begin with they are really just depositing money into their account so no code then, they just get a confirmation e-mail.

Now about the GV Queue.
I will just be using paypal to take payments for now. Do I really need to do that?
If the payment goes through at time of sale like in evening, how would I know anything other than that in the morning to release the GV anyway?

I'm not arguing if course, just trying to get a better idea of things how they work and why.

The choice is yours ... if you feel that you can be confident that all PayPal purchases are valid and complete, then you could set Gift Certificates up to be immediately available upon purchase ...

Another thought, and I have not yet searched for this answer so maybe simple thing.

If I need to cancel a GC amount, how do I do that?

Example from yesterday
Wife bought the first $2 GC and we did not think it worked so I sent back a refund.
Wife bought the second $2 GC and it worked, but she now has $4 GV in her account.

Sending back the refund did not cancel or remove the GV for $2 from her account.
So now she paid for $2 but has $4.

Not that it maters in this case of course, but if it were an actual customer I would need to fix that, especially if it were for $20 and they got $40 :shocking:

Should I have canceled the order someway instead of just giving a refund?

This is part of the advantage of the GV Queue as if a purchase is made, by not releasing the GV immediately the amount is not already placed in the customer's account so if they cancel the order it can be deleted.

Unfortunately at this time, there is not an easy way to remove a GV from the GV queue, but that will be addressed in a future release.

For now, when the customer's GV balance needs to be adjusted in the table coupon_gv_customer and this needs to be done via phpMyAdmin manually.

For a GV in the GV Queue to be removed setting in the table coupons in the field for release_flag to X would maintain a record of the GV but make it unavailable for release.