X-Cart forums

[neonrider]

Example: customer selects delivery by normal mail (stamped envelope, without any insurance or tracking**) the store software would restrict payment methods only to cash payment, bank wire and Zelle, all of such protecting the merchant from chargebacks.

Of course, some stores may not offer normal mail (stamped envelope) delivery at all and only provide some half-assed shipping methods that don't really provide tracking and have no insurance or the expensive UPS etc. Yet to my experience normal mail is a very affordable and popular among customers in North America and in Europe. I used to offer normal mail to India, but soon after I cancelled it since I was hit by chargebacks. Probably stamped envelope mail got stolen in India and the customer was so upset they did not contact me first and went directly for a chargeback. Some customers may think the assumingly dishonest merchant may have never shipped the goods, or merchant may think the customer received the goods but decided to treat themselves to a free gift. Thus I for instance limit orders to $50 or similar amounts that can be shipped by stamped envelope. Although I do sometimes ,mail orders up to $200 by normal mail and they do arrive. never was hit by a dishonest customer that way, except a couple mentally insane cases. Why is this happening when there is mutual trust by using stamped envelope mail, people tend to be more honbest than when methods with protection are used and still are occasionally stolen somewhere. Frequent registered mail theft in the United States lately proves the case. If the mail is registered there must be valuables in it, while stamoed envelope can't have any valuables since it's not registered. This is the way of thinking of most people.

Some customers don't care to purchase insurance yet they want full protection offered by card payments. With such default feature everyone will be happy. Choose fully tracked fully insured postal parcel and pay up for it or if you want to save the $50 or $60 for delivery by fully insured parcel or by UPS then select stamped envelope, pay a couple bucks, pay with bank wire or cash and relieve the merchant from responsibility in case of a loss, which is extremely rare with stamped envelope mail.

I made a lot of research on this. Almost everyone who selects stamped envelope mail (obviously: no insurance, no tracking) selects to pay with credit card, just to make sure or even with a second thought in case of non-receipt they may attempt to dispute the payment even if the store contract states "shipping at your own risk". Don't have to. Don't have to risk if pay for insurance and full tracking which now costs a good $50.

On the other hand, if a buyer selects payment with a credit or debit card or Paypal, the (future dream) store software would restrict delivery methods only to delivery method with full tracking, such as insured postal parcel or UPS with optional insurance.

Once customer places their order online and the checkout is complete, it is too late to convince them to make changes to their order. They will most likely won't bother. Order placing is very emotional. One minute you want it, another one you don't. Once customer selects wrong shipping method or wrong payment method, because of imperfect e-commerce platform, they realize the order was not proceed nor shipped and they don't return and don't reply, no matter what. This has to be done correctly from the get-go.

I was given a quote around $3000 to fiddle with the code and make it work, but for my little shop that is too expensive. Several years ago I have offered this feature to X-cart engineers, to implement it as a default feature, years before I started advertising it to ALL e-commerce platforms around the world. In the long run, many merchants will benefit from this feature, implemented in many carts by default. I believe some day this feature will be implemented everywhere.

** yes that kind of delivery method is cheap and very popular and people are willing to take the risk onto themselves when ordering cheaper goods and saving a lot on shipping charges. But merchant can be hit with charge-backs from an occasional dishonest customer, unless during checkout customer selecting normal mail is funeled only to use bank wire or cash payment. Even then in a couple cases when I felt the customer was honest about not receiving stamped envelope I gave them a good discount to order again compensating their loss in full, as long as they gave me more business. It has to be mutual. Why is normal mail becoming so popular among Americans ordering from overseas today? Since foreign inbound Registered mail no longer provides tracking and is not insurable beyond the measly $40 indemnity. So what's the point paying $10 or $15 for Registered mail when one can pay $2 to $4 (or even free) for the so-called "Air Mail" (stamped envelope) and receive their goods on their own risk, but usually very safely. Statistics show that normal mail or air mail is rarely lost in the mail or stolen, unlike more "flashy" Registered or Priority mail.

[neonrider]

I have got a simple idea how to by using existing default features in X-cart to create something like that where shipping methods would control payment methods somehow, but by using Membership tied to Payment methods. Read on:

In /registered.php replace the languages text label "Sign up for Membership" with the following wording: "Select Delivery method". I know, this is a wrong place for that, but...

Then, at the following page /admin/memberships.php instead of the names for the membership under the drop-down menu enter names of delivery methods such as "UPS", REGISTERED MAIL", "NORMAL MAIL", "INSURED PARCEL", "FEDEX", "PRIORITY", "DHL" etc. etc.

So now when a new customer registers (but only a new customer), they could select shipping method for their future order. I know, that's a weird place to place selection of shipping methods...

Then, under /admin/payment_methods.php creatively apply "Membership" (now replaced with shipping method names) to the Payment Methods there.

I know, the customer will probably still be able to select ANY shipping method down the checkout lane, but now they would be already restricting their own payment methods to what they chose under the "membership/shipping" registration.

Try this and tell us how it went. I will try it too and let you know once and if it works. I know, this is a crazy idea, but its free.