Managing Payment Methods

The 'Payment methods' section of the 'Settings' menu contains the list of payment methods available at your store and the settings for those payment methods which require configuring.

The basic installation of LiteCommerce contains a list of several offline payment methods (Figure 3-14).

Figure 3-14: 'Payment methods' screen

Each payment method is defined by its unique non-editable 'ID' and contains a number of parameters:

•	The name of the payment method as it will appear in the Customer Zone is defined by the 'Method' field.

•	The 'Special instructions' field of the payment method definition can be used to supply important payment information to your customers (E.g.: special instructions for check payment could read "Make your check payable to Our Company").

•	Methods are sorted in ascending order of 'Pos.' (position) values. The order in which payment methods appear in the list defines the order in which those methods appear in the Customer Zone.

•	Methods can be activated and deactivated. Inactive methods are not offered in the checkout process in the Customer Zone.

You can simultaneously edit the parameters of several payment methods in the 'Payment methods' section. When you finish editing, click on the 'Update' button underneath the list of payment method definitions to save your settings and have them instantly reflected in the Customer Zone.

Note: Additional payment methods, including real-time payment methods, can be introduced by installing LiteCommerce payment gateway add-on modules. These payment methods usually require configuring. To configure a payment method follow the instructions provided in the reference manual for the corresponding add-on module.

Two new payment parameters have been included in LiteCommerce software version 2.2:

•	'Default payment method', which defines which payment method should appear as a default option in the checkout process, and

•	'Payment method to be assumed in case of zero order totals', which defines the payment method to be used in certain cases when the use of Gift Certificates, Egoods or Promotion Tools add-on modules makes it possible to place orders with zero totals.

Figure 3-15: Payment method selection screen at the Customer Zone, corresponding to the settings provided in Figure 3-14

When your customers use the store, they see the list of available payment methods at the payment selection screen (Figure 3-15) during the checkout. See the section "Completing Orders" of this manual for further details.