PP Express+Standard transactions deployment problems

Dear Jason, Eric, Ray et al,

I am right at the end of developing my first website using Super Suite. It's looking great. Or it was.

I'm really disappointed to see only now that ecart doesn't have full functionality with the PayPal options available in my country - Australia. PayPal Payments Pro is simply NOT AVAILABLE here (and there is no plan for PayPal to ever introduce it here either, no Authorize.net, I could go on...).

I applaud that the marketing documentation will be/has been updated to accurately reflect functionality is dependent on the gateway available (this is not a choice issue for me) but I just really need you technical support heroes to make my site work along the lines expected, please!

The issue:

So, I've signed up for PayPal Standard but can also supplement this with Express Checkout. Express Checkout alone will not deliver on my needs as I must receive credit card payments as well as PayPal Payments (contrary to some threads, Express does not accept non-PayPal transactions - at least not here in Australia). So my first thought was to use both

But how to start? The cart is created. I have the API username, password and signature for Express and have been fiddling in the checkout wizard accessed via starting with the option "Payments Pro-US" to activate the Express Checkout option. But when I reach the order management pages, I cannot see how I can deploy this product at all whilst my Standard transactions can't receive instant confirmation of a successful transaction (presumably inputs into the order management tables would only be triggered by successful payments - right?) yet Express transactions can. Is this correct? Or would it just be populated with info from the Express transactions and ignore Standard transactions? I can't find any documentation about this (I've read the gsg and every other e-cart pdf under the support section).

Some background info: I'm selling customised digital downloads (each one is unique) and actually/ideally I don't even want/need to create any new order management tables - I simply need to update field (orders.payment_status) from "Unpaid" to "Paid" to transfer the product to the downloadables area when a purchase transaction is successfully completed, and accompany this with a customised receipt (using UE, no probs). How do I do this? The only things I can come up with are:

a) only accept PayPal payment via Express - cutting out 50% of my market or so!
b) only use Standard and process all the orders manually when PayPal sends me the confirmation email that the transaction is successful and none of my customers get their products until then - costing me time, hassle and ,most importantly, a pretty poor customer experience...esp as I live on the opposite side of the planet from most of them!

? What are my options ? Can I do both of these in parallel i.e. Express and Standard? In 1 cart? How would I do that? If I used Express alone, what code would I use to update the field (orders.payment_status) when an Express transaction was successful and what else would I need to make this update. I wouldn't need to create any other tables apart from this. What other ideas would you suggest for solving this problem? Is there something blindingly obvious that I've missed or am unaware of (I hope so!!)?

Please can you raise a SUPPORT TICKET for me today so I can send you the relevant information which I am unable to post here (due to length& confidentiality). I need to get this finished ASAP -I was due to launch next week :-((( and as I'm in such a different timezone need to send all information to you in 1 go with no back-and-forth (each one takes a whole working day off me as we each work during the other's sleep).

I'm so sad about this. These are my last pages to do! Really hope you can help me out soon guys. The rest of it all works great.

Thank you very much in advance for your help. Ann

It looks like the gist of your problem is that PayPal Payments Pro does not work in Australia and you would like to be able to collect payments in ways other than just using PayPal. Have you looked into using the eWay Payment Gateway? It works in Australia and you will also be able to add the PayPal Express Checkout button on your checkout pages. Adding the express checkout button is one of the options in the Checkout Wizard.

Here is a link to the eWay payment gateway home page:
www.eway.com.au/

Thanks so much for the suggestion - but eWAY Australia (according to their staff who I spoke to yesterday) does not apparently accept payments from all countries, requires merchant internet bank account in addition to their annual fees so rather more complicated than I'd a clue about.

Please can you raise a support ticket for me before close of your day (else I lose a day of work here in Oz!). To start with, I'll just need to have PP Standard + Express implemented via eCart. The wizards are not letting me do this so I'd like to send my pages through today for assistance.

Thanks in advance, Jimmy

Ann

I have opened up a private support ticket for you. You can check this by logging in to your account at www.webassist.com and checking your support history.