Pay Pal account optional question

[tgrant]

I've got a question regarding Pay Pal (item #5 in my Payment Methods). For many months it's been working correctly, allowing people who don't have a Pay Pal account to pay with charge card without creating an account.

Lately it seems when checkout Pay Pal is forcing you to create a Pay Pal password and agree to opening a Pay Pal account before it accepts payment. It used to have a button for "choose other payment options" if you didn't have a Pay Pal account.

Can someone confirm this, I don't want to lose customers because they're being forced to sign up with Pay Pal.

[Jamie]

I believe there is a setting for that when you click Profile, My Selling Tools, and then click Update to the right of Website Preferences.
example.png

Do you have that enabled?

[tgrant]

Right now it's set to "ON"

PP1.jpg

[tgrant]

Maybe I'm testing it the wrong way. I've tried checking out with three different e-mail addresses. It seems to recognize the one that owns a PayPal account and tries to force it to pay with Pay Pal. The unrecognized e-mail addresses, it tries to get them to create a Pay Pal password (and agree to an account) before it will accept the charge card.

[Jamie]

I'm not sure. They are supposed to offer paying without an account, but it would make sense for them to force login if they know you already have an account.

[tgrant]

Well it looks like it's a Pay Pal issue. The customer's being taken to Pay Pal, it just seems to be the options on the Pay Pal checkout. I'll try testing it on another computer. It might have something to do with cookies. Thansk!

[tgrant]

I'm still having problems with Pay Pal....I'm running two Squirrelcarts, both are using the identical Paypal Website Payments and both carts have the identical settings in Payment Methods, and over at Pay Pal we both have identical settings in our Pay Pal Website Payments Preferences, identical all the way including having the PayPal account optional turned "on". yet one Squirrelcart takes you to PayPal and gives you the option of Paying with a charge card without having a Pay Pal account, while the other Squirrelcart takes you to a similar window at Pay Pal, but it tells you you have to open a PayPal account to use a credit card. I've tested these on computers with different IP's and with different e-mail names and the same thing starts to happen.

The only difference I can think of is one of the Squirrelcarts has a password on it (presently the site is password protected during testing) but I've even taken the password off and Pay Pal's still forcing the buyer to create an account to use a charge card.

The two different screens seen when checking out at Pay Pal, one forces you to create a Pay Pal account to use a charge card

pay with your debit credit.jpgpay as paypal guest.jpg

[Jamie]

You might want to try asking PayPal support. They can probably tell you why the accounts are acting differently.

[tgrant]

Thanks Jamie. Pay Pal advises that in the Pay Pal account profile, the e-mail address has to be listed as "confirmed" to allow people to check out using a charge card without creating a Pay Pal account. I'm waiting for client to adjust his Pay Pal account then I'll report back. Thanks again, your support's always appreciated

[Jamie]

Ah, OK. Glad you got an answer. I never would have guessed that!