Paypal Integration Instructions

Introduction

Welcome to the PayPal shopping cart integration guide. This document is targeted for customers who have selected PayPal as their shopping cart option and outlines the steps necessary to collect order data from PayPal, format it with XML, and submit the data to EFS for processing in real-time.  

Our integration with your PayPal cart runs on a rolling schedule, where every 30 minutes we contact your API and request all orders for the last 72 hours. Due to limitations of Paypal's API (as noted in their documentation), EFS is only able to view a max of 100 transactions per API call. So, unfortunately, if you have more than 100 transactions in a 72 hour time frame the API call will fail and we will not be able to import any orders in until some of the transactions are no longer in the 72-hour window. Any orders that are not placed will have to be placed manually via the FCP or via .csv upload. 

It is imperative that you monitor your orders / order volume to make sure that we don't miss any of your transactions.

Note: If you already have a shopping cart and only use PayPal as a payment option please refer to the integration documentation for your particular shopping cart

Requirements

The following requirements are necessary before you can begin the configuration: 

• If using PayPal on your own site, the item_number must exactly match the product SKU in the EFS Control Panel. Refer to the "Creating a PayPal Payment Button" section below for more details on this and multi-value SKUs
• If selling on eBay and using PayPal, please use our eBay Documentation for the best experience.

Grant API Access

At this point, the PayPal account needs to be configured to allow third-party read only queries to your completed transactions. This allows the FCP to read your orders but keep the rest of your account data secure and private.

To grant API access, do the following:

1. Click Profile under the My Account tab.
2. Click My Selling Tools, then the "update" link next to API access.
3. Under Option 1 click "Grant API permission"
4. Enter "paula_api1.efulfillmentservice.com" in the form field for Third Party Permission Username and click the "Lookup" button:
5. Check "Obtain information about a single transaction: and :Search your transactions for items that match specific criteria and display the results". 
6. Click the Add button when finished.

 Integrating with EFS

EFS requires some initial setup with your PayPal data when used for the first time. The setup process includes any testing and troubleshooting that may be needed to ensure your cart is working properly.

To get started, contact your Client Services rep via our ticket system with the following information:

• PayPal email address
• Your EFS Merchant ID and Merchant Name, which can be found with your Fulfillment Control Panel account under My Settings from the Client Info tab of your dashboard, then scroll down to Integration Credentials section of this page.
  
  
  
  
  
• The URL of your web site
• Whether or not you are using PayPal for anything else besides this shopping cart.
• Indicate if you have any transactions in your PayPal account
• You will need to choose both an International and Domestic default shipping method. Send your shipping method choices to EFS. If no shipping methods are specified, then EFS's Standard Ground service will be applied for domestic and International consolidated for international orders.

Importing Orders

Order placement wishing PayPal is based on a process where EFS will actively "talk" to your PayPal account looking for new orders at set intervals (20-30 minutes). If new orders are found, the system will attempt to inject them into your FCP account. If there are any problems with an order, the FCP will reject it and send an XML Error Notification email to your configured email address. Please ensure you have configured this type of notification in your FCP account.

Order Flow Process

An order passes through various states from the time it is created until it is closed and shipped. To illustrate, this is an example of the order flow process when generated with PayPal.

Creating a PayPal Payment Button

A PayPal payment button needs to be configured for each product. The Item ID field (referred to as item_number) must match the SKU of the corresponding product within the FCP. This step is crucial if the order is to get generated by EFS as the Item name/ID gets passed along to the FCP to notify the system what items to include in the order. The "Add to Cart Button" will need to be added to the site from which customers check out.

To create a button, do the following:

1. Log in to PayPal
2. Click on the Merchant Services tab. The following screen will appear:
3. Click "Add to Cart Button".
4. On the Create PayPal payment button screen, enter the product data in the fields provided. Important: The Item ID field must match the SKU number in the FCP, as shown below.
5. Click the Save Changes button when you have finished entering all the product details. At this point, XML code is generated to be used for the Add to Cart button. this code should be given to your web page manager to be inserted into your site.

Advanced Button Setup

Customizing your Buttons

When creating a button, you have the option to display many item options. This will create a drop-down field to go along with your butto. Each selection gets a value along with some descriptive text.

To customize a button, do the following:

1. Design a new button, but leave the item number as it is in the PayPal button.
2. Check the Add drop-down menu with price/option box. The following options will appear:
3. Name each menu option with some text about the item (i.e. Small, Medium, Large, etc). When the customer makes a purchase and selects a size, PayPal sends the item number and the option value along withe the order. The FCP will then append the value onto the item number, and that will be the SKU.

Testing your Site

When you have finished configuring your site, several things should be done to ensure that the site is working properly. these include:

1. EFS will verify that your PayPal API is accessible and appearing with the proper SKUs.
2. EFS will next ask you to place test orders from your site and verify that they appear in the FCP. Remember, delete any test orders that you placed to avoid confusion between the test orders and the live orders when testing is complete. Testing is limited to verifying that the test orders provided by the client are imported properly.
3. EFS will make it "live". Note: EFS cannot monitor PayPal orders so testing is your responsibility. Monitor that the test orders are coming through for a week and verify that the EFS development team can read the test orders EFS is not responsible for any lost or missing orders due to changes in SKUs or changes to the shopping cart (API access chang, site goes down, etc.).