Paypal problems recently

We've recently had reason to suspect that Paypal transactions from MP were not going through. When we look for the pending Paypal membership transaction ID in Paypal, the Paypal transaction history screen is not shown. Also, we noticed that IPN was disabled.

I've enabled IPN using our site's URL - is that the correct URL?

Why would the transaction ID show up in the MP subscriber record, but not in Paypal's transaction history?

Also, we understand that there were some Paypal errors happening that were corrected in the latest update. Our original MP subscription has expired. Will the update correct these problems, and if so, do we need to re-subscribe to Membership Pro to fix the Paypal problems?

Hello Derrick

1. The error happens because of a bug in PayPal system itself. Sometime, it send IPN Messages (which is used to notify Membership Pro about the payment) to wrong URL, for example, instead of sending it to domain.com/index.php?option=com_osmember...ent_method=os_paypal , it just sends to domain.com/index.php?option=com_osmembership . It only happens with some transactions . It is a problem with PayPal, not with Membership Pro

2. You are using a very old version which was purchased from 2014, so I do thing that you should purchase latest version and update it to your site:

- To use latest features supported by the extension
- To continue receiving support from us as we provide free support for one year for each purchase only

In case you don't want to purchase latest version for some reasons, you can try to put the code below to the beginning of the file components/com_osmembership/osmembership.php (put it after <?php tag)

Regards,

Tuan

As usual, excellent response, Tuan.

I searched everywhere I could think of to find the proper URL to insert for MP, but no luck, so I just used the site URL.

One of our users reported that when they hit the Paypal button on MP, it returned a blank screen. Also, we are seeing PP transaction IDs on MP, but not on PP IPN history. Are those consistent with having the incorrect link in PP IPN URL setup?

I assume if I add the correct URL from above it will work without updating MP, correct?

I'll look into the update features for areas where the new features might break our particular configuration; once I'm fairly certain I understand the possible side effects, I'll update. We have been using this program for three years and are very satisfied.

Hello

1. Enter site URL into PayPal IPN URL is OK. Actually, Membership Pro registering the URL it want to receive notification with PayPal when someone subscribes for your plan, so the URL you enter on PayPal website is actually not important. All it needs is PayPal is enabled on your PayPal account

2. I don't know why the blank issue happens. Maybe you should try to check it again and confirm that it i working as expected. I saw that you purchased latest version, hopefully, your site is a Joomla 3 website and you can update to that latest version, then everything will be simpler for both of us

Regards,

Tuan

Thanks, Tuan
Yes, I upgraded yesterday and had a user try again; no luck.
We are at Joomla 3.6.5

I was able to successfully log a Paypal membership using a Test Plan that I set up, but none of the legitimate subscriptions are working.

Our last successful membership was March 20th. We've had 14 failed attempts to join from seven members, starting March 21st.

The member that reported the blank issue has tried five times to join; the latest being this morning after we updated MP.

I'll try to get some info from other folks whose subscription attempts have failed.

When someone tries to join, MP logs the transaction code, but Paypal does not show it in their activity log. The Test Plan that tried DID show up in PP in their activity log.

So basically, you are saying that the subscription records are active in Membership Pro but you didn't receive payment in your PayPal account?

Since you upgraded, could you please monitor the next subscription to see whether the issue happens again?

Tuan

No, the subscription attempts are showing as Pending. The PP transaction number is in the subscriber record, but it is not in Paypal's activity log.

The last failure happened after I upgraded. I have a user that is working with us, and asked him to try it after we upgraded. He's tried five or six times overall, and I'm sure he's getting tired of filling out the subscription form.

The only one that's gotten through is my test Plan, 2-3 times. Those went through both before and after the upgrade

Hello Derrick

No, the subscription attempts are showing as Pending. The PP transaction number is in the subscriber record, but it is not in Paypal's activity log.

=> That's actually, a random string generated by Membership Pro before users is being redirected to PayPal. So I guess, in this case, users try to subscribe, but when they are being redirected to PayPal, they didn't make payment (for example, just close the browser), that's why you see no related transaction at PayPal. You can try to contact that user via email, ask them to see why it happens to be sure

The last failure happened after I upgraded. I have a user that is working with us, and asked him to try it after we upgraded. He's tried five or six times overall, and I'm sure he's getting tired of filling out the subscription form.

=> So do you know how we can see the issue ourself? If you have a way to re-procedure the issue, please let me know step by step how I can see the issue. I will then check to see why the issue happens and get it sorted

Regards

Tuan

I believe I've found the problem.... and it's me!

I added scripts to the Plan to send emails on before and after payment.

On the before payment stored script I included a sleep statement; thinking that I could avoid sending both a 'Pending' and an 'Active' email if MP reacted faster than Paypal.

That hangs up the Paypal process and it never completes. I've had one user successfully join after I removed that script, and will be contacting the rest of the pending users and ask them to try again.

As an aside, after I wrote these scripts I found out that the scripts cannot access the Joomla database - which I was using to assemble a collection of email recipients based on a custom field in the MP database. I understand this might be included in a future release.

Thank you for your help; I'll reply to this thread if I am still having the problem.

OK Derrick. Glad to hear that you figured out the reason of the error and it is not related to Membership Pro core package

Tuan