X-Cart 4.6.6: Simplify Commerce by Mastercard, Sage Pay API update, Universal Analytics, VAT exemption for the users with VAT ID
Today we have a double release, a double holiday. Fresh, shining, brand new X-Cart 5.1.9 ( BTW, it has just got the “Multivendor” extension! Read about it here) and X-Cart 4.6.6 are available for downloading. What you get with this update? Read below.
Simplify Commerce by Mastercard
We’re happy to announce about the partneship with another big player of the payment processing market — Mastercard. The “Simplify Commerce” payment solution enables the accepting of all major card brands. In a PCI compliant manner, of course.
This integration is available out of the box, all you need is to obtain the API credentials and fill in the module configuration page.
No setup fees. No card storage fees. No refund costs. No minimums. No monthly fees.
Universal Analytics as the next version of Google Analytics
Back in October 2012, Google announced Universal Analytics as the next version of Google Analytics. With Universal Analytics, you can use all of the standard Google Analytics reports and tools, but you also get access to new features. Check the offical overview by Google Team to find out, what are these benefits.
ACTION REQUIRED:
Before selecting the “Universal Analytics” option of the Google Analytics code version setting on the configuration page of module “Google Analytics” please ensure that your account property is using Universal Analytics. More info is available in the article See if you use Universal Analytics.
If your account property is using Classic Google Analytics , be sure to upgrade it to Universal Analytics before you switch to “Universal Analytics” in your store’s settings. To upgrade, complete “Step 1: Transfer a Property to Universal Analytics”. Step 2 of this instruction (integration code update) is already done by X-Cart engineers.
Sage Pay update to support API v.3
Sage Pay is one of the leading payment gateways in the UK market, and this is where we see quite a large number of X-Cart users. To offer more flexibility, it’s available in two integration forms, so called “Form integration” and “Server Integration”. Both are fully functional and PCI compliant, however the API version 2 is to sunset in 2015, so SagePay integration was updated to support the newest API. Visually, nothing changes, but the code is brand-new.
VAT exemption for the users with VAT ID
Previously, the tax exemption feature was implemented as a checkbox in the customer profile. Editable by Admin only, with the verification being administrator’s responsibility too. Now the customers can specify their VAT numbers, which are validated online via the free web service provided by Vies, and only if the number is valid, the user gets the tax-exempt status.
The aforementioned behaviour is to be enabled with the How to operate with Taxes if customer provided a Tax Number setting on the Tax management page, see screenshot to the right.
Miscellaneous
The comprehesive list of changes can be found in the changelog. But some improvements and fixes are worth mentioning here too:
Google Shopping: The “identifier exists” attribute can now be specified. This is how and when you need it.
The built-in Database Backup feature no longer depends on the SOAP extension – there were complaints about it on the community forum
AvaTax (real-time tax calculation) was fixed to work correctly for “anonymous” customers, i.e. those who prefer to place orders without account creation.
Thanks to Steve Stoyanov (CFL systems), the Advanced Orders Management module got a fix too: Product variants could not be added to the order via AOM if the quantity in stock of their base product was 0. Now it can.