PayPal¶

Paypal is an American online payment provider available worldwide, and one of the few that does not charge a subscription fee.

Note

While PayPal is available in over 200 countries/regions, only a selection of currencies are supported.

Settings in PayPal¶

To access your PayPal account settings, log into PayPal, open the Account Settings, and open the Website payments menu.

Important

Note that for PayPal to work in SotaFMS, the options Auto Return, PDT, and IPN must all be enabled.

Auto Return¶

The Auto Return feature automatically redirects customers to SotaFMS once the payment is processed.

From Website payments, go to Website preferences ‣ Update ‣ Auto return for website payments ‣ Auto return and select On. Enter the address of your SotaFMS database (e.g., https://yourcompany.erp.sota-solutions.com) in the Return URL field, and Save.

Note

Any URL does the job. SotaFMS only needs the setting to be enabled since it uses another URL.

Payment Data Transfer (PDT)¶

PDT allows to receive payment confirmations, displays the payment status to the customers, and verifies the authenticity of the payments. From Website preferences ‣ Update, scroll down to Payment data transfer and select On.

Tip

PayPal displays your PDT Identity Token as soon as Auto return and Payment Data Transfer (PDT) are enabled. If you need the PDT Identity Token, disable and re-enable Payment data transfer to display the token again.

Instant Payment Notification (IPN)¶

IPN is similar to PDT, but allows for more notifications, such as chargeback notifications. To enable IPN, go to Website payments ‣ Instant payment notifications ‣ Update and click Choose IPN settings. Enter a Notification URL, select Receive IPN messages (Enabled), and Save.

PayPal Account Optional¶

We advise not to prompt customers to log in with a PayPal account upon payment. It is better and more accessible for customers to pay with a debit/credit card. To disable that prompt, go to Account Settings ‣ Website payments ‣ Update and select On for PayPal account optional.

Payment Messages Format¶

If you use accented characters (or anything other than primary Latin characters) for customer names or addresses, then you must configure the encoding format of the payment request sent by SotaFMS to PayPal. If you do not, some transactions fail without notice.

To do so, go to your production account. Then, click More Options and set the two default encoding formats as UTF-8.

Tip

For Encrypted Website Payments & EWP_SETTINGS error, please check the Paypal documentation.
Configure your Paypal Sandbox account, then follow this link to configure the encoding format in a test environment.

Settings in SotaFMS¶

Credentials¶

SotaFMS needs your API Credentials to connect with your PayPal account. To do so, go to Accounting ‣ Configuration ‣ Payment Providers and Activate PayPal. Then, enter your PayPal account credentials in the Credentials tab:

Email: the login email address in Paypal;
PDT Identity Token: the key used to verify the authenticity of transactions;
Use IPN: enable for PayPal to work properly in SotaFMS.

Tip

Save the PDT Identity Token for later use.

To set the PDT Identity Token, switch to developer mode and retrieve the token by following the configuration steps at Payment Data Transfer (PDT).

Note

The PayPal Merchant ID is not required in SotaFMS.

Important

If you are trying PayPal as a test, using a PayPal Sandbox account, change the State to Test Mode. We recommend doing this on a test SotaFMS database rather than on your main database.

Extra fees¶

You can charge extra fees to customers choosing to pay with PayPal in order to cover the transaction fees PayPal charges you.

Note

You can refer to Paypal Fees to set up fees.
Traders in the EU are not allowed to charge extra fees for paying with credit cards.

Test environment¶

Configuration¶

Thanks to PayPal sandbox accounts, you can test the entire payment flow in SotaFMS.

Log into the Paypal Developer Site using your PayPal credentials, which creates two sandbox accounts:

A business account (to use as merchants, e.g., pp.merch01-facilitator@example.com);
A default personal account (to use as shoppers, e.g., pp.merch01-buyer@example.com).

Log into PayPal sandbox using the merchant account and follow the same configuration instructions. Enter your sandbox credentials in SotaFMS (Accounting ‣ Configuration ‣ Payment Providers ‣ PayPal in the Credentials tab, and make sure the status is set on Test Mode. We recommend doing this on a test SotaFMS database rather than your main database.

Run a test transaction from SotaFMS using the sandbox personal account.