|
Yes! You can have recurring orders on your store through the use of Shift4Shop's special AutoShip/Recurring Orders module.
This article will give you information on this add-on and how it can be used. It contains the following topics.
Please click on a link below to review the respective area of information:
What is AutoShip/Recurring Orders?
Back to top
AutoShip works by allowing customers to configure recurring orders that are shipped at their convenience. In just a few clicks, shoppers can easily select the quantity and delivery frequency of the product. The software sets up the delivery schedule and automatically produces a new order, captures payment and notifies the customer on the delivery date.
Benefits for your store include:
Back to top
- Increase revenue by encouraging recurring orders and making them simple
- Reduce cart abandonment by saving customers time with automatic billing
- Build brand loyalty, differentiate from the competition and create lifetime customers
- Create more accurate sales forecasts and gain tighter control over inventory
What are the Requirements?
Back to top
- A store on any Shift4Shop plan
- One-time setup fee and an additional monthly cost added to your Shift4Shop plan
Note
These fees are waived for End-to-End Ecommerce Plan holders. Please contact [email protected] to have AutoShip added to your store.
- A tokenization based payment gateway* such as:
- Shift4 Payments
- 1st PayGateway.Net XML
- Authorize.Net (with additional CIM module)
- CardConnect
- Converge
- GoeMerchant XML
- Paymentech Orbital
- PayPal (Powered by Braintree)
- PayPal PayFlow Pro (with reference transactions enabled)
- PayPal Express Checkout (with reference transactions enabled)
- Persolvent Payments Lite
- PPS
- ProPay ProtectPay API
- SecureNet
- Stripe
- USA ePay
- Vantiv
- Vantiv eChecks
Note
Your respective payment Gateway's tokenization methods may incur additional fees from the Merchant Account provider.
Click here for Shift4Shop purchase information, or contact your sales representative to find out more.
The AutoShip recurring order process begins with your payment gateway's tokenization functions. PCI compliance standards rule that for credit card transactions, the only parties privy to the credit card details are the card holder and the payment gateway. In other words, the merchant cannot store or view the credit card number information in any way.
So if the card isn't stored, how can an automated recurring order process like AutoShip re-charge the card?
This is where the payment gateway's tokenization comes into play. Rather than storing the card number somewhere on the ecommerce site for the recurring transactions, the payment gateway creates a set of encrypted tokens (viewable only by the payment gateway) for the recurring transactions coming from the store.
AutoShip Order Process
Back to top
When a shopper places an order for a recurring product, they are asked if they would like to have the order recur and shipped to them at regular intervals. (Hence the name "AutoShip"). During the recurring order process, they are asked to set their frequency of recurring shipments and they check out with their initial order.
When the initial order is created, two invoices are created for the customer's order. The main invoice (for their initial order) is created which you will manually process as usual. However, the second invoice that is created will be a recurring invoice which will act as a template for the future orders. The recurring invoice template will reside in a special order status (called "Recurring") that is created for you when the AutoShip module is added to your store.
Meanwhile, a regularly scheduled script will run on the store that will look at the recurring templates and - when it's time to fulfill them - will take the template, create a new order from it, and present it to you as a New order to be fulfilled.
Additional Information
The Recurring Order templates will share the same invoice number as the original order, but will have a "R_" added to it as a prefix. So, if your shopper places an order for a recurring item and their original invoice is AB-1001, that will be the order you process for the initial shipment. The recurrances of that order will then be based on a template order called R_AB-1001. All subsequent orders based on this template will include a notice of the template it is based on.
Additionally, be aware that the template of the order will record the shipping method used on the initial order, but it will not contain a shipping cost to it. Instead shipping cost will be re-calculated during each recurrence to account for updated shipping costs if applicable. This means the order amounts may differ from time to time because of fluctuating shipping costs.
Please note that if you are making use of our Shipping Insurance feature that this will also be included on recurring charges. So if a customer places a recurring order with shipping insurance, it will also be included on all future orders created from this. Keep this in mind if you are utilizing both features on your store.
Canceling an AutoShipped order
Back to top
To manually cancel a recurring order, simply move its respective template order (The one with the R_ prefix) out of the Recurring Order Status. This will prevent the script from recreating the order at fulfillment time.
Note
Your shoppers with Recurring orders can also cancel the order themselves from their My Account section of your store. Click here for more information.
After you've purchased the AutoShip/Recurring Order add-on and you've received notice from your Project Manager that it has been installed, proceed with the following steps to configure it on your store.
Note
The following assumes that you have already set up your token based payment gateway. If you have not yet set it up, please do so before proceeding with these steps.
- Log into your Shift4Shop Online Store Manager
- Using the left hand navigation menu, go to Modules
- Use the Search Bar at the top and search for "Recurring Orders" to pull up the module.
- When the module appears, click on the "Settings" button
A popup modal will appear with following series of checkboxes to toggle for the module:
- Login Required
This checkbox will make it so that your store will require the shopper to either create or log into their customer record before checking out.
- Show Applicable Payment Gateways Only
When enabled, only applicable payment gateways (those that save the credit card information for future charges) will show up during checkout for recurring orders.
- Enable preliminary notification
Mark this checkbox if you would like to also have the store send your shoppers a notification letting them know that their order will be renewing soon. This email will send out before each recurrence on the order.
- Allow items to be changed
This setting allows your shopper to swap the items (from their recurring orders), to another recurring product in your store.
- Discounts for Subsequent Orders
This drop down has three options:
- Ignore Discounts: If the initial order has a discount applied to it, subsequent orders will not have the same discount applied
- Keep original discount amount: Any discount used in the first order will be transfered over to all the subsequent recurring orders.
- Recalculate promotions/coupons: Any discounts applied to the first order will be recalculated on the subsequent recurring orders.
- Frequency (days or Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Yearly)
This field allows you to define the frequency intervals to be displayed to customers when ordering an autoship product. Enter multiple intervals separated by a comma. For example 5,10,15,20 etc. Also note that - as of version 9 - you can simply write Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly and Yearly in the field to have the store use those intervals.
- Min. Days to Allow Changes
Sets the number of days (before recurrence) in which the shopper is able to change the properties of their recurring billing. For example, if this is set to 5 and the shopper is 6 days away from their next recurrence, the change will be allowed to go through. However, if they are only 4 days away from the recurrence, their changes will not be allowed.
- Min. Days to Allow cancelation
Sets the number of days (before recurrence) in which the shopper is able to cancel their recurring billing. For example, if this is set to 5 and the shopper is 6 days away from their next recurrence, the cancellation will be allowed to go through. However, if they are only 4 days away from the recurrence, the cancellation will not be allowed.
- Number of days to send the preliminary notification before order recurs
Sets the number of days (before recurrence) in which the shopper will receive an email notification letting them know that their order will be renewing soon.
Additional Information
At the bottom of the settings window, you'll see a link to the Recurring Orders Dashboard.
This is a new dashboard that will let you review stats about your store's recurring orders including an overview and your subscriber trends.
The dashboard will also contain links to the following aspects of your store's recurring orders:
- View Recurring Orders
Clicking this button will take you to a filtered list of your store's recurring orders
- View Failed Orders
This button will take you to a filtered list of your store's Unpaid recurring orders which likely failed due to payment not going through.
- Upcoming Order Email
Click this button to review the template for the email that is sent to your customers when their recurring order is about to send.
- Edit Settings
This button will take you to the same module settings described above.
- Report: Recurring Order by Next Date
Click here to view a report of your store's recurring orders by Next Recurrence date.
- Report: Recurring Order Pending Products
This report will be a view of recurrences by pending products.
After configuring the default values, click on the "Save" button along the bottom right corner of the modal window.
The popup modal will fade out and you'll once again see the module. Place a check in the "Enable" checkbox and click "Save" at the top right of the Modules page
Adding Recurring Options to Your Products
These next steps will show you how to further enable the functionality on the products you want to offer the recurring orders feature for.
- Go to Products >Product List and locate the product you would like to offer as a recurring order item.
- Click on the product's thumbnail, ID or name to open it up for editing
- Go to the Product's "Advanced Tab"
- Place a mark in the "Enable Recurring Orders" checkbox for the product.
- In the Recurring Order Frequency field, you may set specific frequencies for the product or use the default intervals set in the Module settings.
- In the Recurrences field, you may specify the number of times the order will be re-created for the shopper. For example, setting it to 10 will let the store process the orer 10 times and then stop the recurrence. Leave this field blank if you would like the product to have an indefinite amount of recurring orders.
- Click "Save" at the top right to commit your changes
- Repeat for the rest of your recurring products as needed.
Tip
You can also assign products to recurring order status using a custom CSV file import.
The following column headers can be used to designate products for recurring orders:
- recurring_frequency_product
Separate each selectable frequency for the product's recurrence with a comma
- recurring_order
Use a 1 to mark the product as a recurring order product. Use a 0 to mark it as not recurring.
Your shoppers will now be able to select their recurring order frequency and the orders will come in based on their recurrence. The frequency can also be selected and edited form the View Cart page prior to their checkout. Shoppers may also cancel their recurring orders or update their order frequency directly from their respective "My Account" access on your store front.
FAQs
Here are answers to some frequently asked questions regarding the AutoShip App
- How far out can autoship be set for? We would need an autoship set for 1 year-can this be accomplished with this application?
There is no limit regarding the Frequency, it's specified in terms of day, but you could set it up to 365 days if needed.
- Would price changes on products automatically update the recurring orders placed before the price change?
No, the price of the product is saved with the order when the order is placed, no changes to the product name or price would be reflected in the recurring order.
- Can I create a promotion that only applies to the first order and not to the recurring orders generated after that ?
By default, the promotions will only apply to the first order. There is a setting under the Store Modules for "Keep discounts on subsequent orders" that will allow to carry over the discount if needed.
- If I delete or change a promotion that was applied to a recurring order, would the discount still be applied to future orders generated by that recurring order?
If the "Keep discounts on subsequent orders" setting is enabled, the discount received in the first order will be carrier over to the subsequent orders regardless of the status of the original promotion. The only method to remove or change the discount would be by updating the recurring order via the admin panel.
- Can I create Recurring Orders with the Phone Order System?
Unfortunately, no. The PCI compatible tokenization process requires that the order be placed on the store front by the actual card holder, rather than through the Phone Order system.
|