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One of the many topics discussed within the Volusion W09 and V5 Manual chapters on Products was the product settings that enable merchants to sell products that have a recurring fee. Whether for magazine subscriptions, software licenses or satellite TV services, online merchants may have the need to continually charge their customers for a service over a period of time.

The Products chapter explains how to configure this behavior for a product itself but what happens when that product is sold? How can merchants manage their Volusion store's recurring payments from customers?

The Recurring Billing functions within the Volusion Administration Page was designed to help merchants manage these types of incoming payments. This chapter will explain how to access and use this portion of the Volusion Admin Page.

Getting Started:

Volusion's Recurring Billing page can be reached by doing the following:

• Log into the Volusion Admin Page and be sure the Orders tab is selected.
• Click the Recurring Billing link in the light blue menu bar.
• By default, merchants will now see the Recurring Payments : Due table. (Version 5 )
• Within the Recurring Billing pages, merchants can access lists of all recurring payments in the store, all payments due and all declined payments as well.

Using one of these three tables, merchants can view information on all orders which have products set up for recurring payments, view the balances of recurring payments and collect these actual payments as well. Other features are provided here such as the ability to view upcoming payments based on calendar date and more.

Part I - Recurring: Due:

The Recurring: Due table is located in the Recurring Billing page. This page will list all payments due or overdue on the current day of business. From here, merchants can view a list of payments and then process payments for products ordered from their store that have a recurring billing value. Merchants can also view recurring billing totals received as well as view lists of recurring billing orders based on future dates.   (Version 5 )

Each entry in the Recurring: Due table contains the following information:

Recurring: Due
ID	This field contains a unique ID number generated by Volusion and assigned to each record in the "Recurring Billing" page. Note that this ID does not correspond to the order or product - it is simply a number assigned to the "Recurring Billing" record to track it.
OriginalOrderID	This field will contain the ID of the order the product set for recurring billing was placed on. Clicking on this ID will redirect to the order's details page.
OriginalOrderDetailID	This field will contain an ID number associated with the order details page related to the order that generated the recurring payment record.
BillingFirstName *	The first name of the customer that placed the order associated with the recurring payment will be listed here.
BillingLastName *	The last name of the customer that placed the order associated with the recurring payment will be listed here.
BillingPhone *	The phone number of the customer that placed the order associated with the recurring payment will be listed here.
EmailAddress *	The email address of the customer that placed the order associated with the recurring payment will be listed here.
CustID *	The customer ID of the customer that placed the order associated with the recurring payment will be listed here.
PaymentMethod *	The payment type that was applied to the initial payment and will be applied to each additional payment is listed here.
DueDate *	The due date of the next recurring payment will be listed here.
RecurringPrice	The order detail ID for the order the product set to use recurring billing options was placed on will be listed here.
Recurring_Notes	This field can be used by merchants to enter any notes they wish for a recurring billing record.
StartDate	The initial start date of the recurring payment will be listed here (mm/dd/yyyy).
EndDate	The date the recurring billing option will end (if applicable) will be listed here. If an ordered product was configured to bill customers indefinitely, this field will be left blank.
HowOften	A value can be set in this field to configure the frequency at which the payment will reoccur. This value will represent the number of months that will lapse before the next billing due date. For example, enter 6 into this field will configure the recurring billing record to require payment every six months after the initial stating date.
LastPaid	This field will contain the last date (mm/dd/yyyy) that payment was received for the recurring billing record.
Delay_Charge_Until	This field can be used to delay the recurring billing charge date until another specified date. For example -to offer the first 12 months of a service for free, this field should be set to a calendar date 12 months after the date in the StartDate field. Note that this field is automatically populated if a recurring payment is declined. The date automatically entered into this field will be one increment of the payments recurring period (e.g. if the recurring period is set to 1, this field will be incremented 30 days should the payment be declined).
Active	This option will allow merchants to set a recurring billing record to be active or inactive. By default, newly generated orders for recurring billing products will be set as active.

* These fields are only available within the main table view of this page. The individual record settings view will not contain these options.

Note that the settings available for each recurring billing record can be edited within each record's settings page however, these fields will typically be set when a recurring billing product is ordered through the Volusion storefront.

Merchants can modify these settings to adjust billing dates, amounts or even deactivate the billing process - depending on how merchants may need to manage their recurring billing orders.

Additionally, within the main Recurring: Due page, there are 3 functions or settings that can be accessed:

Enabling Recurring Donations:

Some online businesses - particularly non-profit organizations may wish to offer "products" within their Volusion store to solicit donations. This can be done quite easily by configuring an open-priced item. However, merchants can take this a step further and offer recurring donations.

Recurring donations perform just as regular products set for recurring billing with the exception that, generally, the price for the donation product will be set to be editable so customer can specify the exact amount they wish to donate.

To fully activate recurring billing for a donation-style product, merchants must configure one final setting after setting up their donation in the Volusion Products table.

• Log into the Volusion Admin Page and click on Recurring Billing.   (Version 5 )
• In the Recurring Billing page click on the Recurring_Due Settings link.   (Version 5 )
• Enable the setting marked Donations_Enable_Recurring.
• Click the Save Changes button within the popup.   (Version 5 )

Once this is done, any product set up as a donation with recurring billing settings applied to it can be processed within the Volusion store.

Viewing Future Recurring Payments:

Within the Recurring: Due page, there is a Search Date button. This field will allow merchants to Search the Recurring database for future recurring orders.

In Version 5 there was a Date field directly on the Recurring Due table (Version 5 )

Note that merchants cannot use this feature to collect recurring payments due on future dates. Merchants can only collect recurring payments on orders with due dates that are on or before the current day of business.

Processing Recurring Payments:

Collecting recurring payments is simple in Volusion Version W09 and V5:

• Once in the Volusion Admin Page, click on the Recurring Billing link.   (Version 5 )
• In the Recurring: Due page, click the "Charge" button.   (Version 5 )
• A message will be displayed, allowing merchants to define the number of payments due they wish to collect.   (Version 5 )
• Payments are collected in the order of the date their related order was opened within the Volusion store.
• For example, collecting 5 of 10 due payments will collect payments for the first 5 payments based on their starting dates.
• Once this is done, all outstanding active payments due on or before the current day of business will be collected.
• The page will reload, with the list of all collected payment totals within the green area at the top of the page.

After collecting payments all recurring billing records in the Recurring: Due table will be removed. These payment records can be reviewed within the Recurring: All tab within the Recurring Billing page.

Part II - Recurring: All:

Clicking on the Recurring: All from the dropdown at the top of any page under the Recurring Billing link in the Volusion Admin Page will reveal a table containing a list of every instance of recurring billing that has been registered within the Volusion page.   (Version 5 )

This table can allow merchants a way of viewing or even adjusting all recurring payment records (both active and inactive) within the Volusion store.

Additionally, a green field containing recurring payment totals will be located at the top of this page. These fields will act as indicators to show the total amount merchants have collected in recurring payments for the current month as well as the total collected over the course of the current year.

The records within the Recurring: All table view contains information identical to that listed in the Recurring: Due table view as well as within each individual record.

Within each individual record stored in the Recurring: All table (click on the ID of the record to view its individual settings) merchants will find an additional area that will list all active recurring billing records associated with the customer who ordered the product related to the recurring payment record they are currently viewing.

This table will contain information such as the ID, Order ID, recurring prices and notes as well as start and end dates for each recurring payment associated with the customer.

Part III - Recurring: Declined:

Any recurring payment that has been attempted to be collected on and was declined access to do so will be listed in this table.

Merchants can access the Recurring: Declined table by simply clicking on the dropdown for VIEW and choosing the table name from within any part of the Recurring Billing pages. This table will contain information identical to the Recurring: All or Recurring: Due page however will not contain any additional controls.   (Version 5 )

Recurring payments listed here have been declined access to funds from a merchant's credit gateway or payment processor. This can be due to a lack of funds on the credit account, the account being expired or for other reasons.

In the case of declined payments that should be collected by the merchant, it is recommended to contact the customer via the information provided within this table to inform them of the declined payment and, preferably, resolve the unpaid order.

Tips and Special Settings:

Dealing With a Declined Recurring Payment:

From time-to-time, merchants using Volusion's recurring billing functions may encounter a recurring payment that is declined when an attempt is made to collect funds for that payment.

When a recurring payment record is declined, it will automatically be entered into the Recurring: Declined table within the Recurring Billing page.

There's no need to panic - resolving the issue of a declined recurring payment is simple and can be done in the same manner merchants would address any declined payment from a customer - albeit with a few extra settings that need to be applied.

• First, examine a declined payment in the Recurring: Declined page.
• Click on the OrderID for the related order to view the order's details page.
• Merchants will want to note the payment applied to the order and contact the customer via phone or email.
• Inform the customer declined payment and secure a new or updated form of credit payment from the customer to apply to the order.
• Within the Payment Log, click on the pencil icon near the credit card's expiration date field.
• This will redirect to the Volusion storefront where credit card information that has been applied to the order can be edited.
• Once the credit card information on file for the customer's order has been updated, click on the Orders tab then click on the Recurring Billing link.
• Click on the ID of the recurring payment record to edit it.
• Set the Delay_Charge_Until field in the payment record to the following business day and click Save Changes.

Once this is done, upon the following business day, the recurring payment will appear again in the Recurring: Due tab of the Recurring Billing page. Merchants can attempt to collect payment for this record again. Provided the updated payment information is correct, merchants can collect the overdue payment for the record and the recurring billing functions for the payment should then continue to be collected as normal.

Issues With Recurring Payments and PayPal:

Due to the nature of some electronic payment services such as PayPal or Google Checkout, merchants may have difficulty using these types of services in conjunction with recurring payments in Volusion.

Some services (PayPal in particular) have their own built-in recurring billing functions that can supersede those of the Volusion store. As with all PayPal payments, once the payment is placed within Volusion, the order's payment is considered complete as payment for the order will be complete carried through the PayPal service.

Due to this behavior, recurring payments in Volusion can be conducted using PayPal as a form of payment method however, the reporting systems within Volusion will not be able to track the financial data for recurring payments paid for via PayPal accurately.

For this reason, PayPal, Google Checkout and other, similar payment methods are not recommended for use with Volusion's Recurring Billing functions.

Note on Configuring Recurring Payments:

Please note that when configuring a product to use recurring billing that the Volusion recurring billing system will by default, bill customers for period specified plus the initial period of billing.

For example, when configuring a product to bill customers once a month for the course of a year, entering a value of "11" into the Recurring Duration field and a value of "1" into the Recurring How Often field.

In this case the product will charge customers its recurring price once a month for 11 months plus the additional, initial recurring charge.

Note on Recurring Payments and Credit Card Policies:

Merchants offering products configured for recurring payments (e.g. magazine subscriptions) will want to set their credit card storage policy option to "Never" (as in never remove data from the system) and redefine the default value of days to keep credit card data to a value that will cover the length of time they will need to bill their customers on a recurring basis (e.g. 9,999 days). This setting can be found in the Volusion Admin Page under the Settings tab by clicking on the Payment link and then disabling the "Use Most Secure Settings" option.

Merchants will need to do this as the Volusion store's default credit storage policies will purge credit card data, preventing them from being able to collect recurring payments from customers.

Summary:

Volusion provides the tools merchants need to run their online business. Some merchants may need to bill their customers over a period of time - depending on the products they may wish to offer through their stores. These features can be set within each product in Volusion. Volusion's Recurring Billing features will then help merchants organize and process recurring payments from their customers as well as help them track recurring revenue totals.

Tags: recurring billing, subscription, recurring charge