Several issues using HikaShop Business edition

Hello HikaShop:
We are having some setup issues getting HikaShop Business to do what we need it to do. Let me start by outlining our objectives for the store, then proceed to issues we are having.
Objectives:
1. Sell caricatures through a web store
a. Select an image (e.g. action hero, martial arts warrior, glamour queen, etc.)
b. Provide picture of customer or gift face
c. Create and e-mail caricature of face on selected image
2. Front-end – simple and quick checkout/payment
a. Provide picture of face
b. Provide e-mail for shipment (return caricature)
c. Payment through Paypal Website Payment Standard (Paypal or credit card)
3. Back-end – allow merchant to easily determine:
a. Orders
b. Abandoned carts
c. Site visits
Issues:
1. Provide face picture(s) – we have handled this using a file ‘custom field’ with required entry
2. Provide e-mail for shipment – we can use a ‘custom field’, but find that we cannot easily send a confirmation e-mail. Is it possible to use a custom workflow such as cart, field, login, payment where login only requires the entry and confirmation of an e-mail address? Or what would you suggest that will allow a confirmation e-mail?
3. We are working with Paypal Canada to determine how to setup the HikaShop Paypal Payment plugin. The URL we have used is www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr , but unfortunately that requires the customer to use his/her Paypal account (which is OK) or to create a Paypal account, i.e. not to just enter a credit card number. A couple of questions, is the Paypal payment plugin to be used for Paypal Payments Standard? What URL should we be using if the above is incorrect?
4. Orders get created before payment is complete, which leads to a combination of paid orders and abandoned carts. How does the business owner (merchant) easily know which are paid orders and which are abandoned carts? How should we configure HikaShop to show the paid orders?
5. Where in HikaShop does the business owner see abandoned carts?
6. Where in Joomla/HikaShop does the business owner see Site Visits?
Thanks for your help.
Jim Stephens

Hi,

1. That's the good way to do that.
2. I think that you can use the "Simplified registration" in HikaShop > Configuration > Checkout.
3. The PayPal url is correct, on the paypal website, the customer can pay by credit card. If you want only pay by credit card without creating an account, you can use the paypal pro plugin.
4. The paid orders have the status "confirmed", by default all the cart with the status "created" are not paid.
5. There is actually no option to see abandonned carts.
6. I think that there is a component for google analytics on joomla, you should find it on the extension website of Joomla.

In HikaShop you can have reports on the orders, and have many statistics about it.

For 3 above, we require Paypal Payments Standard, NOT Paypal Payments Pro.
Paypal Payments Pro costs $CAD 35 per month and Paypal Payments Standard in Canada and the U.S. allows payment without creating a Paypal account for no monthly fee. I think the features should be the same in Europe. What do you need from me to fix this issue (URL is paypa.ca)?

For 4 above, we do not see the status "confirmed" in the orders that have been paid though Paypal. What do we need to setup differently?

Thanks for your quick response.

Jim Stephens

Thank you for responding over your weekend.
I have resolved issues 3 and 4.

Regarding issue 2, where you responded " I think that you can use the "Simplified registration" in HikaShop > Configuration > Checkout ", we are trying a couple of 3rd party registration extensions i) one click registration and ii) Paypal Subscriptions PRO. Neither seem to work the way I expected. Changing to "Simplified Registration" has no change on the fields required to be entered, so I think you may have a programming error or I don't understand what "Simplified Registration" should do. What should it do? Do you have any other suggestions?

Thanks again for your help.

Jim Stephens

Hi,

Here are the parameters description for the different kind of registration in HikaShop:

Registration : When this option is set to "no registration" the fields name, username, password and password verification from the HikaShop registration form will be removed and no Joomla user account will be created for the user on the website. When it is set to "simplified registration", those fields will also be removed but an account will be automatically created for the users and an email will be sent to him with his assigned username and password. When this option is set to registration, the users will have to register on the website during the checkout. This option is available in all commercial versions of HikaShop (since 1.3.7). On the starter edition only the registration mode is possible. Finally, please note that when you sell digital goods, the download of these goods is restricted to the users who bought the digital goods. In order to do that check HikaShop needs you to have user accounts for your users, which means that you will have to use either "registration" or "simplified registration".

Thanks Xavier.

We are using your new version 2.0.0, Business Edition.
After several trys, i found out how to make "simplified registraion" work. I had to unpublish all custom fields associated with registration. Then I saw:
Login or Create a New Account
E-MAil *
E-mail Confirmation *
Address Information
Fields marked with an asterick (*) are required

Then I got an e-mail saying:
Your account has been created and an activation link has been sent to the e-mail address you entered. Note that you must activate the account by clicking on the activation link when you get this e-mail before you can login. By clicking on the activation link, your account will be activated and you will be able to continue your order.

After activation, HikaShop performed as outlined in your previous e-mail.

A couple of suggestions:
a) The e-mail confirmation * (asterick) does not seem to be required, so it is not working
b) Your documentation should provide instructions on having to unpublish all the name, address, etc. custom fields
c) Login must be set to yes (for future logins) and simplified registration selected
d) For our use, we do not want the customer to have to create an account and login as this requires too many steps (they will usually not register and purchase). I suggest you consider another registration procedue that required just the e-mail and its confirmation as 'mandatory' custom fields in the checkout process that would then allow the 'next' step to be payment. This registration procedue should simlpy be named something like 'Required E-mail Registration' and no e-mail should be sent until the payment e-mail.

I'll continue to try and find othe registration extensions.

Jim Stephens

Yes, we should add this to the documentation. I add this task on our TODO list.

I think that what you need is in Joomla > Users > User manager > Options (in the toolbar), then set the option "New User Account Activation" to "None".

Hope this will help you.

Xavier, this seems to work.

Is the message "Login or Create a New Account" and "Registration" (in red and both with large highlighted text) from HikaShop or Joomla and how can these messages and text size be changed?

As per my previous note, the E-mail Confirmation does not work - is this a HikaShop or Joomla problem?

Thanks for your help - we're really close to what I want to do.

Jim Stephens

Jerome, I'm getting HikaShop to nearly do what I want it to. Some more questions and comments:

How do i change the "Logon or Create a New Account" text to something like "We require registration of your e-mail address" ?

The "Registration" function requiring re-entry of the "E-Mail Confirmation (asterick)" doesn't work (isn't required) - is that a Joomla or HikaShop problem?

I have enabled "login" in the checkout workflow, would a "register" option eliminate the "Login or Create a New Account" text? I think "Register" should be a workflow option to match the HikaShop Configuration option of "Force a Menu on the Checkout" - Register and No Login selection.

In the User Manager - Users - Options, I set "Send Password" to No, yet the customer still gets an e-mail with his ID and password - is this a Joomla or HikaShop problem or do I need to set another switch? I found a way around this issue by unpublishing the HikaShop System - E-mail for User account, so that the User gets created but the e-mail is not sent. Should HikaShop be checking the "Send Password" User Options field?

I enabled the "HikaShop joomla user account plugin" - what does this plugin do?

After payment has been made through the HikaShop Paypal payment plugin, the following error message is included in the confirmation e-mail:

The status of your order No. Z22 has been changed to confirmed.

SUMMARY OF YOUR ORDER

Name Unit price Qty Total
Super Man CAD1.00 1 CAD1.00
Final total : CAD1.00

Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/egwsys/public_html/heromeup.com/test1/media/com_hikashop/mail/order_status_notification.html.php on line 271
Billing address

Telephone:

Is this a Joomla or HikaShop problem and how do I eliminate the error message and Billing address and Telephone fields?


Thanks for your help.

Jim Stephens

Jerome:

As we want the customer to input a minmum amount of information and shipment is by e-mail, we only reqested only an e-mail (and its confirmation).

The "Registration" function requiring re-entry of the "E-Mail Confirmation (asterick)" doesn't work When do you estimate this will be fixed?

Using your instructions, we removed the "Logon or Create a New Account" text and inserted several additional custom fields, followed by "Registration".

You are right, when all registration fields except for the e-mail fields are unpublished, the error message occurs. I'll try to remove these fields in the order status notification e-mail to the customer.

Thanks for all your help. Your support is outstanding.

Jim Stephens

Great support! Thank you.