PayPal Advanced not working with Layout C

[manytrickssw]

We're successfully using Layout C and the white form page, and have had zero complaints about the lack of branding or the odd domain name.



(We were one of the early adopters in the linked discussion, so you can probably blame us for the lack of an iFrame -- we were getting continual failure reports from users due to the third party cookie issue. Since the change, not a single complaint.)



We were able to put our logo at the top of the "Billing Information" form, so perhaps that's helping users feel comfortable. I honestly can't recall where we did this, but it's somewhere within the twisty maze of passages that are all part of the eJunkie configuration screens.



Once a user clicks off that page, they are taken to the actual paypal https site, so I think that allays any fears -- at least for our users, it's never been reported as an issue or reason they didn't buy.



You can see our credit card integration by adding any of our products to the cart (hover over an icon and click Buy), then clicking the credit card logo: http://manytricks.com.



regards,

-rob.

[gorilla]

Thank you Rob, I'm glad to hear that you are not losing sales because of the poor Layout C implementation on submit redirection instead of iframe.



Have you processed credit cards before with other system (Authorize.net) before changing to PayPal Advanced Payments? I'm curious to see if revenue was the same or decreased-increased with the new integration.



Regards.



Daniel

[manytrickssw]

No, we've always only used eJunkie (didn't want to try to integrate two disparate systems into our buying process). When we saw that they'd added Pro support, we signed up and dove in.



Credit cards now make up about 5% of our purchase transactions; the vast majority of our customers pay via PayPal, and a much smaller percentage pay with Google (which we'll probably drop soon).



-rob.

[gorilla]

Same here, PayPal is king, Google almost non existent and credit cards are about 5%-7% , I'll love to drop everything and stay with PayPal but not everybody wants to use it.



You are mentioning PayPal Pro, I thought you had Advanced, how do you like the Pro service?

[manytrickssw]

Whoops, too early in the morning: we have Advanced, not Pro.



-rob.

[gorilla]

Thanks Rob.

[E-junkie_Guru]

BTW, the custom logo/header Rob mentioned can be uploaded in Seller Admin > Edit Profile. This would be shown at the top of the initial checkout screen where we request the buyer's address(es) before redirecting them to the actual payment screen. It appears you've already uploaded your custom logo/header, gorilla, so I'm mostly just mentioning this to confirm that with you and in case anyone else reading along here may be curious about it.

[gorilla]

Yes I did that long time ago for my regular form but that does not change anything with the raw Layout C redirection to a white page with that PayPal module with no logo or branding, styles, alignment,etc.



Another question for the guru, how is that plain html admin coming along? I remember 3 years ago (!) I was told that the launch was imminent. I understand that code need to be written from scratch etc, but three years is a long time in this business where mobile is key right now, I'm reading bad reviews of e-junkie on popular sites like smashing magazine, my affiliates definitely do not like e-junkie features and they are wishing to have a different affiliate program and I'm wondering if I should start looking for other options to move my business with modern features or they will come to e-junkie soon?



I'll appreciate an honest answer.

[E-junkie_Guru]

Yes, unfortunately we can only add your custom logo/header to pages we manage, such as the initial checkout page; PayPal provides no way to customize their final payment page. Note that the third-party cookie blocking issue would affect ALL sites that use PayPal Advanced with Layout C embedded in an iframe; that issue isn't just something peculiar to our own system.



As for the new Admin, we had some false starts and unforeseen setbacks in 2011, but about a year ago we hired an experienced new developer specifically to help out with the new Admin project and got a fresh start on that; we are very conservatively projecting it should be done by the end of this year, and optimistically projecting very much sooner if all goes to plan. Initially, we're just shooting for feature-equivalence with the current Admin, to keep the project scope focused and avoid feature creep that would only set things back even further, but once that's done, we'll be able to start modifying it as needed to support new features and functionality.

[gorilla]

Thank you for your honest answer to help me with my decision.

[adamv]

This is very disappointing news. I agree with gorilla completely and actually opened a ticket minutes ago regarding the hideous looking white form (before I found this post).



I also have a hard time believing people would trust and use that form. Maybe because I've been programming professionally for 10 years, but the appearance is embarrassing and doesn't exactly scream "legitimate, safe, secure business".



I started with eJunkie because of price, but as my eBay and website sales increase I really need an online cart that accepts on-site payments. I was trying to decide between eJunkie with PayPal Pro / Advanced or a more robust solution like Shopify. Looks like I'll have to bite the bullet and invest energy in that.

[E-junkie_Guru]

We agree that the final payment screen for card-based payments using PayPal Advanced is not exactly confidence-inspiring when displayed by itself, but unfortunately the iframe embedding method that PayPal intended for that form requires setting a third-party cookie, which caused problems for a significant number of buyers, as Rob mentioned above. That number will only increase as people upgrade their browsers and as more browsers block third-party cookies by default, not to mention people increasingly enabling that setting deliberately for privacy reasons (as most third-party cookies are used for advertising and tracking purposes). This third-party cookie-blocking issue will affect EVERY site that uses an iframe to embed that payment form as PayPal recommends; it's not something peculiar to E-junkie.

[adamv]

I understand completely. It's disappointing for me because I know for my business I have to take the "on-site" processing step within the next year or two. I prefer to take this step with eJunkie because I have my site designed and traffic coming to the existing URLs.



I don't want to start a store from scratch with say Shopify and result to redirects for my existing traffic. Also, eJunkie integrates great into my site and it looks great (beside the page in discussion).



Maybe making A/B templates available to some like mentioned above could be a solution. I sell tangible goods, but offer free shipping on all products so the shipping calculation issues wouldn't affect me either.



I want to end by saying, I love eJunkie's cart! I really do. If you guys could get a professional looking on-site checkout solution/page, it would really bring your service full circle.



Oh, and fix the flash login so I can manage my store from my iPad

[E-junkie_Guru]

Okay, Development says that for specific sellers upon request, we can disable the part of our code that requires Layout C, so you can set up Layout A/B in your PayPal Manager and see if/how it works for you. To confirm your identity and attend to this request, we would need you to email Support with your E-junkie account password, or your Subscription ID (from your Seller Admin > Account Summary screen), or your original activation code (from the original "Account information" email we sent you at registration):

https://www.e-junkie.com/ej/contact.php



Bear in mind this would be considered an unsupported hack for use entirely at your own risk, as we have not tested this at all nor researched any settings or other parameters that may need to differ from the standard setup for Layout C, so we can offer no guarantees. Once we disable the Layout C requirement for your seller account at our end, you would be expected to configure any needed settings in your PayPal Manager and test it on your own to make sure it actually works.

[gorilla]

What is the status on the checkout pages, it's been 2 years now and I'm hoping that this was improved and we can select good professional layouts for checkout pages instead of a box in top left corner on a white page? I've had numerous customers contacting me directly asking to verify if this was a scam or not as it looks like it is a scam and not part of the website at all.



Can we use a good checkout layout yet?



I've been contemplating moving to other scripts like easy digital downloads but as you know it is not easy to just move everything out and I'll prefer to stay with e-junkie.

[E-junkie_Guru]

PayPal still has not addressed the third-party cookie blocking issue which compelled us to adopt the compromise approach we're still using now (as explained above). Furthermore, it appears they are no longer actively developing or promoting PayPal Payments Advanced, in favor of pushing PayPal Payments Pro, so it seems unlikely they will ever resolve this problem.



If you might consider upgrading to PayPal Payments Pro -- which uses a single, self-contained, secure page we manage for your card-based checkouts -- this help page explains how to integrate that with E-junkie:

http://www.e-junkie.com/ej/paypal-partner.htm



Unfortunately, checkouts can never occur on your own site/domain with E-junkie due to our inherent nature as a centrally-managed service which does not install any software on your server; this is one of the tradeoffs for our ease of use and site integration.

[gorilla]

I'll call PayPal today regarding your answer, I'm unaware that they are trying to discontinue the service I'm using and their support is very good so far, I'm using them for 8 years without issues. I've tried that link but the checkout page is just a white page with some form fields and a logo on top, looks pretty much the same as what I have now but centered, all hosted shopping cart companies like yours or even WordPress plugins like Easy Digital Downloads offer a plethora of payment gateways and a great checkout experience, is the checkout page here http://www.e-junkie.com/ej/paypal-partner.htm the best that your company can offer in this modern web browser and apps age? it looks totally out of place and it does not inspire customer trust when you get a page like this.

[E-junkie_Guru]

This is the page where I found PayPal Payments Advanced listed as a "Legacy product" which is "No longer actively marketed; now included with PayPal Payments Pro":

https://developer.paypal.com/webapps/developer/docs/classic/products/payflow/



Elsewhere in that documentation, they have indicated that "Legacy products remain available for pre-existing users", so it seems they will continue to support existing integrations using it into the foreseeable future.



We've already prepared the design for a more modern, mobile-responsive card checkout page, but Development still needs to actually implement that as a live checkout page, replacing our current card checkout page (which is not responsive, as you've seen). When that project is completed and goes live, we would post a notice to our System Status & Updates forum here:

http://www.e-junkie.com/bb/forum/6

[gorilla]

Ok but your proposed new solution for PayPal payments Pro looks pretty obsolete too, that is my issue, if you offer an amazing looking checkout page I'm going to make sure that I meet all requirements and move my accounts to take advantage of this checkout page but so far it is the same page but centered and with a logo on top.



I understand that you may be developing one page but the latest e-junkie.com changes from flash to html took like 6 years?



I would love to use this new mobile responsive checkout page but you do not have it right now and I need to move fast, what about the integration with EDD? I see that they need to receive the product purchase data to from url, I'm already sending transaction data to a url from E-junkie to my sever for customer account creation, can I send transaction data to EDD script too? Can your software allow to send transaction data to two URLs? I assume this would pretty easy?



If I can send info data to EDD plugin and also data to my account creation script I'll be spending a little more money but I'm ok with that as I'll be offering a superior checkout experience.



Here is the info:



http://docs.easydigitaldownloads.com/article/408-e-junkie-purchases-setup-documentation





This could solve my issue retaining customers after they click the purchase button until e-junkie release their own modern checkout page.



Can you please let me know?

[E-junkie_Guru]

There are ways to have us post the order details to more than one URL, and I've contacted EDD support to clarify something about their integration which would determine the best approach for that; however, EDD's E-junkie integration would only have us post the order details to EDD after we're done processing the buyer's order, so you'd still be using E-junkie's purchase buttons and checkout -- i.e., this wouldn't allow you to use some other checkout experience and then have E-junkie issue download links after the buyer has paid.