If you use BigCommerce, we offer a native app that will enable you to sell subscriptions, payment plans, wholesale programs, and much more on the BigCommerce platform. You can read more about the PayWhirl + BigCommerce integration in the BigCommerce app store.
Requirements:
The BigCommerce Store using a Stencil theme (more info)
The BigCommerce payment gateway must be able to vault a payment method (Stripe and Braintree support this). For Stripe, navigate to BigCommerce Settings → Payment Methods → Stripe Settings and ensure that ‘Enable stored credit cards with Stripe’ is checked.
The latest BigCommerce app permissions must be accepted by opening the PayWhirl app from inside your BigCommerce store
To connect your PayWhirl account to BigCommerce, please follow the steps below...
Locate the BigCommerce Recurring Payments & Invoicing by PayWhirl App in the app marketplace by doing a quick search for PayWhirl.
Click "Get This APP" on the PayWhirl / BigCommerce app listing page.
Grant PayWhirl permission to access your BigCommerce account by clicking the checkbox and clicking the "confirm" button.
Once the app is installed, it will appear under the 'Active Integrations' section of your PayWhirl account.
You can click the "Name" link to give your integration a name (only displayed to you) once it's installed and decide if you want the native checkout settings (currently in beta) This new integration uses the built-in BigCommerce checkout and product pages
Note: You can also install the app from the PayWhirl Apps and Integrations page.
Click "Install App" next to BigCommerce.
Click "Install App" next to BigCommerce.
Login to the BigCommerce Account you want to connect.
Ensure the payment gateway is configured to save payment methods
In BigCommerce navigate to the Settings > Payment Methods and ensure it is configured to save credit cards
Configure Selling Plans or Selling Plan Groups
Now that the app is installed, you can set additional settings for your selling plans. You can create plan groups for our native integration. These groups are mainly used to attach subscription options—like subscribe and save—to your existing BigCommerce products.
This guide explains more about how BigCommerce plan groups can be configured and attached to products in your store.
If you are not using the new native integration our original selling plans will now have options to configure orders. You will see a new "BigCommerce settings" section appear at the bottom of your selling plans in your PayWhirl account.
This allows you to control how orders are placed in BigCommerce and determine what customer group (if any) are assigned to people with the plan.
For example, if you created a selling plan for a subscription where you ship something monthly, you would most likely want to leave it on "Place orders on ALL successful payments." However, if this plan was for a layaway program, you might want to use the "Place orders only on the LAST successful payment" option.
Testing and Going Live
We always recommend testing everything before you go live. If you are using our native integration you will need to test via a checkout in BigCommerce. This may require a live card, but you can refund the purchase after it has been processed. While BigCommerce supports test transactions, switching the payment gateway into test mode is required, which could impact live customers browsing your store. We only recommend using the test mode when this won't impact customer signups (IE during scheduled downtime or on a sandbox store before release)
Otherwise, once you have created your plan(s) in PayWhirl, you can test the integration using the PayWhirl Test Gateway (which is installed by default in your account). You can test and simulate everything in the PayWhirl system using our test gateway before going live.
Read More about testing
Read More about testing
On PayWhirl, you have the option to create customers in the backend (as an admin) and subscribe people to plans in your account... OR... You can install a payment widget into a page on your website so customers can select and purchase subscriptions automatically.
Either way, after you run a test charge, you will see a product, customer, and order in your BigCommerce account (assuming you have BigCommerce orders enabled in your test plan settings).
If you would like to test your widget(s) without installing/embedding them into your website you can use the "Full-Width Preview" button inside your widget settings (top right corner) to launch your widget into its own page as a preview. Once your widget is in preview mode, you can test a checkout just as a customer would using the PayWhirl Test Gateway.
Note: Please make sure you are logged out (as a customer) before each test checkout on the preview page.
For example, here is an example of a customer checkout in a widget preview... This is what your customers will see after they select a plan and checkout in one of PayWhirl's embedded payment widgets.
Once you have generated a test purchase, you will see a CUSTOMER appear in your BigCommerce account.
Finally, if you can see any ORDER that are generated by your PayWhirl customers with all of their invoice details, shipping information and customer profile questions / answers (in the staff notes section).
Thats it!
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Please let us know if you have any questions.
Sincerely,
The PayWhirl Team