The PayPal payment system on your site

Accept paypal purchases on your e-Commerce website

TOWeb integrates natively and by default the PayPal payment system so that your visitors can make purchases by credit cards on your e-Commerce website.

Paypal payments

The payment system PayPal accepts and offers different types of bank cards (Visa, Eurocard-Mastercard, American Express, ...). Using the PayPal payment system for your e-commerce site, your visitors will have the choice to either pay by credit card or by their PayPal account if they have one. Registration in the payment system PayPal is free, there is no subscription, fees are only levied on every purchase (see www.paypal.com site for more information about the offers and conditions their services).

You can now create your PayPal account since www.paypal.com site and then indicate your email account TOWeb address at the "Options> E-Commerce> Payment methods" screen to use this payment system to your online e-commerce site.
See also other supported payments.

Use PayPal Checkout V2

PayPal Checkout V2 is the new version recommended by PayPal for all purchases made from e-Commerce sites and it is also the one now available by default since version 12 of TOWeb. In addition to offering more security as well as the choice between 2 purchase buttons (via PayPal or credit card), this version will also allow your customers to make their payments in several installments. You will therefore be able to maximize the sales of your products to your customers, including those with low budget and wishing to be able to spread a payment over several weeks.

If you previously used PayPal Standard on your site created with TOWeb 11 or a previous version, you will need to delete your PayPal payment and then add it again with the latest TOWeb version. And if you were using a PayPal Personal account, you will need to migrate your account to a Professional one.
Using PayPal Checkout V2 requires knowing and using your PayPal "Client ID", an identifier that you can obtain from the PayPal website by logging in to your PayPal account and clicking on “Developer”. From this developer screen you can then use :

  • the "Sandox" mode which is PayPal's test mode which will allow you to simulate payments from your site to test it
  • the "Live" mode which is the normal mode allowing you to accept "real" payments on your websiteby PayPal or credit card

From there, go to the API Credentials page of your account to find your "Client ID" (or create a new one using the API APP options) that you will need to "copy" (using the "Copy to clipboard" button located next to it) and then “paste” into TOWeb at the appropriate “Merchant Account” tab.

Note: if you previously had a PayPal account for personal use then only "Sandbox" mode will be offered to you to carry out your tests. To use "Live" mode and accept real payments you will need to activate "Live" mode and upgrade your account, either by migrating your account to Professional, or by creating and using a new Professional account with a different email address.

Operating issues during PayPal payment

If during the PayPal payment from your PayPal site you find an error check the following:

  • If you have activated the option "Upload customer information to PayPal", make sure that you have left ALL necessary customer fields on your order form: Name, First name, Address, City, Postal code and Countries with both the options "Use" and "Mandatory". If you have deactivated one or more of these fields, then you will have to activate them again from the "Options > e-Commerce > Order form > Standard fields" screen or you will have to deactivate the option "Upload customer information to PayPal" because PayPal does not accept incomplete information
  • Some security upgrades imposed by PayPal effective since 2017 may impact your site:
    1. The first measure impacts only TOWeb e-Commerce sites when selling downloadable digital products (ie sales of music files, photos and other types of downloadable files only). If it is the case of your site then PayPal obliges you to use the HTTPS protocol at the level of your server.
    2. The other PayPal measure concerns all e-Commerce sites hosted on servers that do not already use at least version 1.2 of the TLS protocol and version 1.1 of the HTTP protocol.
    • What should you do ? contact your web host to determine if your web server has all the security updates required by PayPal and if you do not ask him to do the necessary for your hosting.

Create a custom button PayPal "Donate" or "Buy Now"

You want to add a simple "Buy now" button (without any shopping cart nor order) or a "Donate" button using PayPal on your site? A button that can be placed in the footer of your website or in any section of any topic and this perfectly integrated with your TOWeb theme? Here's how to proceed:

  1. You must have a PayPal account (and thus create it from www.paypal.com if you do not already have one). Once logged into your account then open the PayPal button creation page.
  2. Then click on the link "Create a new button" and select the desired type of button like for instance "Donate" or "Buy Now".
  3. Complete the rest of the form fields, taking care to specify a name (this text will be the one displayed by PayPal during checkout) and if possible leave the option "Use my secure merchant account ID".
  4. Once completed the form, click "Create button"
  5. On the result page, then select the "Email" tab in order to copy/paste the URL of your payment button. This URL should normally be of the form:
    https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=XXXXXXXXXXXXX

This is it, all you need thereafter is just to paste this URL into a link that you have created in TOWeb

  • either by creating a link on an image of your choice placed in a paragraph,
  • or by creating a text link that can also be placed into a button with a icon of your choice
and thus obtain a customized PayPal payment button fully integrated to the theme of your site and/or the content of your topic.


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