Streamlining PayPal payment gateways/checkout

-- HikaShop version -- : 2.3.2
-- Joomla version -- : 3.3.6

I have an issue with PayPal payment plugins and workflow. Our setup:

Actual physical products being sold
Guest checkout
PayPal std
PayPal Pro

My client is trying to allow standard PayPal to allow customers with a PayPal account to use that mechanism for payments, or use their credit card.

Standard PayPal doesn't require name and address, credit card, etc. The customer is simply sent to PayPal payment gateway page (at paypal.com) to complete their order. That works fine, however, PayPal standard does not allow a customer to use a credit card without a PayPal account.

Using PayPal Pro, we need to collect an email address, billing and possibly shipping addresses, and credit card info. This also works fine for credit card users, but doesn't allow the user to use their PayPal account.

The problem is the requirements and order of the checkout workflow: In order to reach the "Checkout" button at the end of the checkout process, the guest user must enter their email and addresses even if they intend to use the standard PayPal checkout (which is entirely ignored by the standard PayPal process). This is unnecessary and for mobile devices, a pain at best.

We'd like to streamline this process as follows:

1. The user is presented their shopping cart, adds a coupon code, if necessary, and shipping selection, and gets their order total.
2. The user then chooses the payment gateway before having to enter any email/address/cc info.
3a. In the case of standard PayPal, they are sent to the PayPal page and completed their order, and are returned to the site.
3b. In the case of the PayPal Pro, they enter their email/address/cc info and submit the order. They never leave our site.

I can't see how this is possible with the current payment plugins and checkout workflow. Is this possible, and if so, how? Has anyone written custom code to work this way?

I tried the PayPal Express plugin, but it does not work the same with a selection of payment gateway at the final Submit checkout, so this also is an issue. Having three different "flows" for the different plugins is also very confusing to the customer, so this is not a viable alternative. The ultimate goal is to allow guest customers to use their PayPal account OR a credit card. It has to be easy to make a payment for guest customers.

Thanks.

Sorry, this should have been posted in the Payment Methods or Checkout forum...

Hello Nicolas,

Hikashop 2.3.4
Joomla 3.3.6

I am having problems configuring the checkout process of my eshop here:

(URL removed)

What I am after is a checkout process that only uses PayPal and works in the same manner as these 2 sites do:

shop.rachelantonoff.com/

shop.friendsoftype.com/

Their checkout process does not require registration or the completing of a form.

I have the shop configured so that once a customer chooses an item they can either go directly to checkout or continue shopping.

I would like this process:

1. The customer chooses an item and then either continues shopping or checks out.

2. Once the customer chooses to checkout they should then be transferred directly to PayPal where they will then log into their PayPal account and complete their purchase from within the PayPal site.

The sites shown above allow this to happen, is this simple checkout possible with Hikashop?

I know I need to read the documentation and I have and am continuing to do so however I am having trouble finding the answer to this.

Thanks for all your support

Just wanted to let everyone know that I solved the problem I posted earlier

I have attached a screenshot of my Simplified PayPal Checkout setup for anyone else who might what the same

There is always something more to fix.....

This is the default code that the PayPal plugin uses to go to PayPal with to continue the checkout process and allow the customer to pay with PayPal.

www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr

This is OK except that I would like to force this to open a new window and I am unable to figure out the code to make this happen

Also if the customer empties the cart the next thing they see is a 404 error page???

HELP!!! All advice welcome....

STILL LOVING HIKASHOP!!!!!!

As always EXCELLENT SUPPORT!!!!!

I have one more problem I can not figure out....

When I am in my shopping cart and I go to the PayPal window, here is the default code:

www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr

Can someone please tell me how to alter it to force PayPal to open in a new window? The idea is that once a customer finishes paying or decides not to continue they come back to my shop...

Can this be done?

Many thanks to everyone.

MANY MANY THANKS!!!!!