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PayPal yellow "Return To Merchant" button not showing up on receipt page, why not?

by TimGross
15 replies
I don't use PayPal that much, but in the past when I set up a simple "Buy Now" button with PayPal, on the receipt page it shows a "Return To" button like this:



...But now when an order's processed through my PayPal account, it doesn't show that graphic any more, the "Return To" link is just shown as a plain text link which is way too easy to miss.

When I place a test order from my personal PayPal to my business PayPal account it just shows a text "return to" link, and a couple of people have told me recently they didn't see the "return to" button when they purchased from me...

Is anyone else having this issue? Does anyone know what variables cause it? I figured there would be related discussion about it but I don't see anything. Any ideas?
#button #page #paypal #receipt #return to merchant #showing #yellow
  • Profile picture of the author Raydal
    I've had the same complaint as well and I think Paypal is
    testing out a new order page so maybe that's why
    the change. I had to change my order process
    because of this.

    -Ray Edwards
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  • Profile picture of the author rondo
    There was a thread about this a few days ago. I can't believe they haven't fixed it yet.

    http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...lXACqpcmHl4TgJ


    Andrew
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    • Profile picture of the author TimGross
      Originally Posted by rondo View Post

      There wa a thread about this a few days ago. I can't believe they haven't fixed it yet.
      Ah, thanks for the link... I did several searches with "return to merchant" in quotes and for some reason didn't find that thread or anything else about it, so I started thinking I was having some weird problem of my own.

      And thanks for the quick post Raydal, yeah, I've got order scripts I can use to process PayPal orders, but when I'm doing a quick test promo it's a hassle. -But it's better than emailing each buyer individually to give them download links.

      Thanks again for the info, glad to know it's not just me.
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  • Profile picture of the author rondo
    I just made a purchase and not only was there no button, there wasn't even a link. So there's no way to return to the merchant's page at all! Crazy.


    Andrew
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  • Profile picture of the author tecHead
    Through the tests I've run, I wind up with less Customer queries when I have my PayPal options set to "Auto Return to Merchant".

    This way, there is no need for the Customer to click anything in order to return to your site after purchase. You merely need to specify the URL you want the Customer returned to post purchase in your Buy Now buttons or PayPal form code; simple.

    HTH
    PLP,
    tecHead
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    • Profile picture of the author Johnny Slater
      The problem with auto return is that it doesn't work for people with new PayPal accounts, as well as a few other situations. If your delivery system relies heavily on the customer returning to your site then the current situations with PayPal screwing up the entire payment flow can cause nightmares.

      This is one of the reasons I have delayed the release of any new software. My products rely on PayPal checkout so instead of selling now and having to deal with support issues from customers who can't get what they paid for I am waiting until PayPal gets their heads out of the ground and finally fixes the checkout processes that have been broken for months.


      Originally Posted by tecHead View Post

      Through the tests I've run, I wind up with less Customer queries when I have my PayPal options set to "Auto Return to Merchant".

      This way, there is no need for the Customer to click anything in order to return to your site after purchase. You merely need to specify the URL you want the Customer returned to post purchase in your Buy Now buttons or PayPal form code; simple.

      HTH
      PLP,
      tecHead
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      • Profile picture of the author tecHead
        Originally Posted by Johnny Slater View Post

        The problem with auto return is that it doesn't work for people with new PayPal accounts, as well as a few other situations. If your delivery system relies heavily on the customer returning to your site then the current situations with PayPal screwing up the entire payment flow can cause nightmares.

        This is one of the reasons I have delayed the release of any new software. My products rely on PayPal checkout so instead of selling now and having to deal with support issues from customers who can't get what they paid for I am waiting until PayPal gets their heads out of the ground and finally fixes the checkout processes that have been broken for months.
        I don't see how a new PayPal account would have anything to do with the auto-return feature; nor have I ever run into this. But, stranger things have happened.

        By your own admission, though... if your checkout process is that heavily reliant on the Customer getting back to your site via the PayPal checkout flow; then you need to have a back-up system that simulates where PayPal may be leaving off, (that's what I do by default).

        You have to give PayPal a specific link to return the customer to; so, have your IPN listener script; (which is what its for, actually); send the Customer an eMail with that link in it. Simple.

        There shouldn't be any reason you're holding back on product releases due to any changes at PayPal; or should I say you shouldn't allow there to be.

        HTH
        PLP,
        tecHead
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  • Profile picture of the author rondo
    TecHead most people have auto return turned off. Many carts and scripts advise vendors to turn it off because it can be unreliable in passing data. Also a lot of big players like CB also have it turned off.

    Paypal have been fiddling with this for weeks now. I'm suprised more people aren't talking about it. Hopefully the problem is isloated to a small number of accounts.

    I also wonder if it's affecting affiliate commissions from being recorded properly.


    Andrew
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    • Profile picture of the author tecHead
      Originally Posted by rondo View Post

      TecHead most people have auto return turned off. Many carts and scripts advise vendors to turn it off because it can be unreliable in passing data. Also a lot of big players like CB who also have it turned off.

      Paypal have been fiddling with this for weeks now. I'm suprised more people aren't talking about it. Hopefully it's isloated to a small number of accounts.

      I also wonder if it's affecting affiliate commissions from being recorded properly.


      Andrew
      mm, ok.. well, (not to be the devil's advocate), but the PDT function of the auto-return feature was an after thought by PayPal; so, I wouldn't suggest anyone relying on it to pass data back to the site anyway.

      From that standpoint, yeah... I can see it being unreliable.

      CB uses the APIs for handling their membership transactions, actually. So, yeah.. they don't need it turned on.

      Really; from what I've understood from the head dev's over at PayPal; the auto-return feature was really only implemented for those merchants that complained about their Customers clicking back into their accounts to check the transaction history instead of going to the Merchant site... passing data; (like mentioned above); was an after thought.

      For any data from PayPal you should always use the IPN; even if you have to shell out the dough to have a listener coded for you. That's been PayPal's most reliable form of data transfer since I can remember; (even when they had clogs back a couple years ago -- they keep logs and retry even when your site is too slow to respond or doesn't respond at all).

      They've also implemented a feature in the History section where you can force IPN data to be resent for any transaction.

      Personally, I only use the auto-return feature to get the Customer back to my site. The page they land on is always the same no matter the product/service; "Remember to white-list this email address because its how you get all your purchased materials from us". I then use the IPN to serve whatever needs to be served.

      By relying solely on the IPN; it doesn't matter if the auto-return feature is unreliable OR if they click to go somewhere else, because its a direct communication between me and PayPal minus the unpredictability of the Customer's post transaction actions. 99% less worries about anything.

      HTH
      PLP,
      tecHead
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  • Profile picture of the author XoOaiL
    I don't use PayPal
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  • Profile picture of the author rondo
    Ok TecHead well you seem to know a lot more about this stuff than I do!

    As an affiliate I'm concerned that if the customer isn't returning to the merchant page then some of my affiliate sales aren't being tracked . Do you think this is a valid concern especially for sales made through networks like CB or CJ?


    Andrew
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    • Profile picture of the author tecHead
      Originally Posted by rondo View Post

      Ok TecHead well you seem to know a lot more about this stuff than I do!

      As an affiliate I'm concerned that if the customer isn't returning to the vendor page then some of my affiliate sales aren't being tracked . Do you think this is a valid concern especially for sales made through networks like CB or CJ?


      Andrew
      Hey Andrew,

      Well, without getting too technical... and trust me, that's very hard when it gets to stuff like this with all the variables involved...

      CB, I know for sure had their own IPN; which is supposed to respond in the same manner as the PayPal IPN. I've not done enough testing with it (yet) to give any accurate reporting; but from the tests that I have run for myself and clients.. it does a pretty decent job and the timing is pretty solid.

      CJ, I've never really used them enough to be able to report on their functionality; but since '09 they've had an API that gives real-time commission information. Meaning, you can get IPN like data from them, as well.

      iDevAffiliate is programmed (very well) to work with the PayPal IPN; but how its implemented is strictly dependent upon the Affiliate Manager. So, you can get the same type of IPN type data from those AM's that use iDevAffiliate, as well. Ask them.

      So, yeah... I can see that its a valid concern but not a concern that can't be remedied with viable solutions.

      HTH
      PLP,
      tecHead
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  • Profile picture of the author Nathan Alexander
    Does software like DLGuard get around this? I'm thinking about getting it.
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  • Profile picture of the author rondo
    Thanks for that TecHead.

    Nathan I believe DLguard sends an email with a download link, so the customer will still have access to the product by email even if there is no 'return to merchant' link or auto-return.

    Many vendors don't send a download link so I imagine there will be a lot of customer service issues. For example I'm still waiting to receive the digital product I purchased earlier.


    Andrew
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  • Profile picture of the author Johnny Slater
    tecHead,

    You have to remember that not all PayPal payment/delivery systems are the same. The vast majority of membership scripts rely on data returned when the user returns to the merchants site as verification data to verify a valid payment has been made before the customer can set up a user account with the website.

    If you have auto return turned on then no data is posted back by PayPal. If you are using a simple solution that emails a download link to a customer then that's not a big issue.

    If your implimented system, and remember that most membership software works this way, relies on the payment data being returned with the customer back to your site then you can NOT use auto return.

    As for the new account. It is stated somewhere in the Paypal documentation that auto return does not work for new PayPal accounts.

    As for me having to wait on releasing my products, PayPal around 6 months ago changed the checkout process to now allow echecks to be used to pay for subscriptions. This was not something that was openly announced that I can find, and I had not known about this change until about a month ago. This meant I had to go back and rewrite my IPN to handle echecks since I have an instant commission payout process and just having the merchant not accept echecks wouldn't handle the issue.

    Also, just one or two days ago Paypal implimented new API so that the adaptive payment system can now accept credit card payments without the customer being required to have a Paypal account. This is a new change, one of many, that hasn't gotten a lot of publicity and wasn't announced very loudly. Paypal have been making sweeping changes to their entire line of processes since they came out with adaptive payments and most of the changes are done without being announced in any way at all.

    As to specifics about returning the customer data with the customer, many systems use that data to verify a valid payment before sending the customer through the flow to get the download. Pretty much every top level membership software use the returned data to verify payment and customer information. There are quite a few valid reasons for needing that process to work smoothly.
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