Another limited Stock and Sold Out Question

[paultony]

Hi, I’ve just purchased the wp-eStore plugin, and so far I am pretty impressed with how well it works. So for that, thank you very much. I’ve been going through quite a number of these plug-ins, some free and some paid, and so far, everyone of them have been quite buggy.

What I have is more of a question and not really an issue, yet :

Say I have products that are only limited to 1 of each, which can be both tangible or intangible (e-goods).

Now let’s say that 2 or more prospects come to my store and decide to purchase the same product at almost the same time, which is quite possible if you’re doing and e-mail campaign that is time-limited.

What happens in terms of the product being sold out?

What I mean is, if the product is only limited to 1 item, and both prospects check out at the same time, and then both actually make payment at almost the same times, is it possible for both of those prospects to purchase that same product before it gets registered as sold out?

Or,

Will PayPal somehow send notification to the plugin in sufficient time to prohibit the other prospect that might have been a few seconds too late to actually purchase the product?

Thanks in Advance,

Paul

[amin007]

Hi Paul, I understand what you are saying… the way eStore works is that it takes the item out from the inventory when you actually make a payment for that item. So as soon as someone hits the “Pay Now” button and the payment is confirmed this will happen.

I do understand your concern about someone else making the purchase at the same time too. eStore is mainly designed for digital products so it works out fine as this is usually not an issue with digital product.

The other way to handle this is to take the item out of the inventory temporarily as soon as someone adds it to the cart and if the checkout do not go through then put it back. But the issue with this method is that statistically you will have many people adding the item to the cart but only a few will make the actual payment. So if you take the item out of the inventory for someone who is not really going to make a purchase can lead to not having a sale as the other person who would truly purchase item couldn’t get it at that time.

WP eStore is meant to be a simple solution and what I have there works for most.

[paultony]

Hi amin007,

Thanks for replying.

Ok, so if have 2 prospects adding the same product to cart and then make payment at slightly different times (say a few seconds apart), will one payment go through and the other not?

Sorry for pressing on this question amin007, but I just need to make sure so that I know what approach to apply, depending on the situation. Because if both payments go through, then I am forced to delay digital delivery until I know who the first buyer is, and then refund the buyer that was a few seconds late.

Warm Regards,

Paul

[amin007]

With a bit of tweak you could make it so if the item is sold out then the person who comes later will not get the download (this way if mutliple purchases are happening at the same time only the person who confirms the payment first will get the item).

Does that sound like a suitable solution?

[paultony]

Yes, I think that could work for me. How can we go about doing this?

[amin007]

Open the “paypal.php” file and search for the following line:

$download_link = generate_download_link($retrieved_product,$cart_item_data_name);

Once you fine it, replace it with the following:

if(is_quantity_availabe($product_id,$cart_item_data_quantity))

{

$download_link = generate_download_link($retrieved_product,$cart_item_data_name);

}

else

{

$download_link = "Sorry! This item has been sold out!";

}

Now if a purchase takes place simultaneously then the person whose payment gets confirmed first will get the product the other person will get the “sorry” message and then you can explain the whole scenario to the customer.

[paultony]

Great! Thanks for that!

[paultony]

Just a quick question:

will both payments still go through, except one gets the product and the other gets the sorry message, or will only the first payment go through while the other just gets the sorry message?

Also, if the buyer that purchased that product to late, but has another product in his cart that is in stock, will the “sorry message” block out both products or just the one that got sold out?

[amin007]

“will both payments still go through” – yeah because they are both buying at the same time. If one confirms the payment and then someone else comes the the later one won’t even be able to add it to the cart so we have no problem there.

The “sorry” message will only be applicable to the one that just went out of stock.

[paultony]

Ok, that should not be a problem. I will just give a longer explanation in the sorry message, then give that customer a refund. Is it possible to have a code that will automatically refund the buyer that comes too late ?

Thanks for helping me out with this one amin007.

[amin007]

You can issue a refund from your PayPal account easily.

[paultony]

Not a problem. Was just being a little cheeky to see how much automation I can get

Aside from that, got all the new tweaks updated, and so far they are working great. Thanks for the excellent support!

[paultony]

I have another question regarding this cool tweak:

I understand that the buyer with the “sorry message” won’t get the download links on the thank-youpage.

Will this extra bit of code also ensure that the buyer with the “sorry message” does not receive an email with the download link?

[amin007]

LOL… I have a question for you: “What are you selling?”

That tweak is for the email. If you are delivering the product through the “Thank You” page too then you will need to add another tweak. I will send you the tweak via email.

[Author]

Posts