[OFBiz] Users - Auto approving Credit Card orders ...

[Brad]

David & Ian, I have a similar scenario as Ian's. For some orders, for us 
to approve the order, the customer must secure the order with a valid 
credit card even if they are ultimately paying by check or wire. At the 
time of the order creation a mere authorization is performed. Obviously 
a failed authorization gives the user an error message and takes them 
back to a page for them to make any corrections. A successful 
authorization places the order into a queue for manual processing by an 
authorized employee. Authorizations that had a mismatched zip code or 
something are manually followed-up with the credit card banks to combat 
fraud in a way similar to Ian's. From this queue, the orders are 
"approved" or canceled based upon the results of the manual verification 
(if it was required as our policies require). The authorization *may* 
later be captured when the order is being shipped. In our situation, if 
it is like Ian's, we do not have or desire an automatic approval in 
general. Automatic capture of payment is certainly not desired for us 
because fulfillment of the order should be several days away which, as 
you stated, could potential violate some merchant agreements. 
Additionally in our case some orders may not actually be paid by a 
credit card at all, but a valid authorization was required to confirm 
the order in the first place, so a capture may never occur and the 
authorization should be left to expire after some time. Some 
establishments for some market-sensitive products require a customer to 
secure their orders with a valid credit card in the event the customer 
does not come through with the agreed payment terms (late fees, 
cancellation fees, losses from failed transaction).

Just an example use case to consider.

Brad Date: Sat, 01 Apr 2006 11:23:44 -0700 From: "David E. Jones" 
<jonesde at ofbiz.org> Subject: Re: [OFBiz] Users - Auto approving Credit 
Card orders ... To: OFBiz Users / Usage Discussion 
<users at lists.ofbiz.org> Message-ID: <442EC530.4070706 at ofbiz.org> 
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed For credit 
cards the auto-approve will only happen if the authorization succeeds. 
Of course, if it is setup to use the dummy authorization this will 
always succeed. The trick is that if the authorization fails then the 
order will be canceled. There are payment methods that support off-line 
payment and such, but if you want to require them to enter a credit card 
then you'll probably have to make some code changes. Note that the 
downside of not doing automated credit card processing is that you can't 
authorize the card when the order is placed, so you have no idea if the 
card is good or not. For the fulfillment process this gets in some shady 
areas because when you run the card manually you generally authorize and 
capture at the same time, and then if you don't have it "packed" you are 
technically breaking credit card usage rules for sales that are shipped 
to the customer. -David Ian Gilbert wrote:

> > Hi David,
> > 
> > Although originally we used Worldpay where a callback could 'Approve' the order, we have now moved
> > to manual processing of credit cards as we have the facilities and it saves us money.  This means
> > that the order still has to go through this stage which would ordinarily have been automated. 
> > Whilst this isn't really a big deal it would be better for us if all the different payment
> > mechanisms worked in the same way so I'm wondering if there is a way of easily switching off the
> > auto approve process for credit cards?  Otherwise we can change our processes here which probably
> > makes more sense.
> > 
> > Best wishes
> > 
> > Ian
> > 
> > On Fri, March 31, 2006 23:38, David E Jones wrote:
> > 
>   
>> >> Ian,
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Most retailers don't want to have an order approval process that adds
>> >> another step to what is necessary for fulfillment. There are of course exceptions to this, which is
>> >> why we created to order approval workflow a long time ago (and this is still in place and should
>> >> still work, though I don't know if anyone has used it in a while...).
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Even for wholesale to more generally sales to businesses where prices
>> >> are custom to the order the price is usually decided on by the company. This can be done by an
>> >> employee using the Order Manager to enter an order (from scratch or based on a quote or whatever),
>> >> or by an employee creating a quote for a customer that the customer can then accept on the
>> >> ecommerce site, placing an order without being able to change quantities, etc.
>> >>
>> >> Is there a specific approval process that you need to cover?
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> -David
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Ian Gilbert wrote:
>> >>
>>     
>>> >>> What is the rationale behind auto approving orders taken with payment made by credit card?
>>> >>> Whilst
>>> >>> I can understand that the actual payment might be approved surely this approval process is an
>>> >>> internal one and so should wait until the actual order is approved rather than the payment?
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Ian Gilbert
>>> >>> www.ethicalshopper.net Fair trade: the alternative choice for your everyday shopping
>>> >>> 0845 456 2429