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LinkPoint HTML FAQs Following is a list of frequently asked questions for the LinkPoint HTML payment solution. General Questions 1. Are there browsers specific issues for LinkPoint HTML? 2. What credit cards are supported? 3. What is the difference between Virtual LinkPoint and LinkPoint HTML? 4. How does LinkPoint HTML work? 5. What are the minimum "technical" requirements needed to implement LinkPoint HTML? 6. Does LinkPoint integrate LinkPoint HTML into my website? 7. What kind of customization can I do with LinkPoint HTML? 8. What should I do if I need more customization capabilities? 9. What are the three methods of implementing LinkPoint HTML? Technical Questions 1. How does the merchant receive their initial password? 2. Is the merchant required to change their initial password? 3. What Data Fields are required for the payment mode I have chosen? What is required in the Order Number field? What is required in the Customer Name field? What is required in the Customer Address field? What is required in the City field? What is required in the Zip field? What is required in the Phone Number field? What is required in the Fax field? What is required in the E-mail field? What is required in the State field? What is required in the Credit Card field? What is required in the Credit Card Expiration field? What is required in the Reference Number field? What is required in the Amount field? 4. How are transactions post-authorized and settled? 5. How long is a pre-authorization valid? Answers to General Questions 1. Are there browsers specific issues for LinkPoint HTML? All Virtual LinkPoint & LinkPoint HTML pages may look slightly different in different browsers, especially data entry forms because they contain many edit fields with fixed lengths. This difference can be due to functions like word wrapping, edit field rearranging, etc.  This is usually caused by default font used by browser and other defaults that depend on the operating system of the user.   Netscape 4.0 and Microsoft IE 4.0 seem to be work consistently (they are the recommended browsers). In IE 3 or other earlier browsers, the pictures can change and points of information may change. 2. What credit cards are supported? American Express, MasterCard, Visa, Discover, Diners Club/Carte Blanche and JCB.  A drop down menu is provided for all credit cards currently being accepted by the merchant. 3. What is the difference between Virtual LinkPoint and LinkPoint HTML? LinkPoint HTML has the same restrictions as Virtual LinkPoint for point-of-sale data entry. LinkPoint HTML has the following input fields are omitted: order number (re:payonly,fullpay), comments, reference number, and amount. The amount field will be calculated by the merchant’s shopping cart. 4. How does LinkPoint HTML work? Every website consists of HTML files, some websites simply have one page others are made up of many pages. Many people use "HTML Editors" such as Microsoft FrontPage to create the HTML files.  HTML stands for Hypertext Markup Language and is a series of tags that state how the document should appear. For example, if you wanted the text to be bold, you would put the tags <b> to begin the bold and </b> to end the boldness. The <b>cat</b> ate the bird. In this sentence the word cat would appear in bold letters, this is a WYSIWYG presentation of the above data. The cat ate the bird. In order to add real-time payment processing to your website you need to add a few special HTML tags. In HTML editors, these tags are often hidden and as you create your documents you have a more WYSIWYG (What You See [on the screen] is What You Get [when you print it out or look at it on the web]) interface. In the HTML editor you are using you need to find the instructions to view the "HTML Source" so that you may modify it.The tags you are adding are hidden and do not affect the page in any way. 5. What are the minimum "technical" requirements needed to implement LinkPoint HTML? The storefront or web form must calculate the total dollar amount to be charged.  The dollar amount must then be transferred into the value of the "chargetotal" data field. For credit card transactions, the required fields will differentiate dependent upon which mode you choose. Calculation of chargetotal and transference to the data field falls outside the scope of LinkPoint HTML. It is the merchants responsibility to calculate this amount and pass it to the engine from the form, using any mechanism you choose. For example, you might calculate the "chargetotal" using a CGI program associated with a web form.  The web form asks the customers to choose which products they they would like and the quantities they choose to buy.  You could also use a Java applet to calculate the total, or you could simply hardcode the pricing information so that when a customer chooses the "Buy One" widget button, a pre-determined charge total is passed. 6. Does LinkPont integrate LinkPoint HTML into my website? No, this is the responsibility of the merchant, webmaster, or in general whomever maintains the website. 7. What kind of customization can I do with LinkPoint HTML? As a merchant, you can customize the look of the secure order page, the e-mail receipt sent to the consumer, and the URL that the consumer is sent to after the credit card transaction is complete. All of this can be configured on the Merchant Account Setup page. You are able to customize the "thank you" page, the logo, the background, and the company name. 8. What should I do if I need more customization capabilities? If you need to customize your site more extensively and you are a C++ programmer, you can use the LinkPoint API. The API references 'C' Libraries which integrate into your existing shopping cart code and fully automate and control the consumer experience. The consumer will never leave your web site and the libraries that are supplied in the toolkit will create a secure socket connection across the Internet to the LinkPoint Secure Payment Gateway. 9. What are the three methods of implementing LinkPoint HTML? There are three methods of  implementing LinkPoint HTML.  You need to carefully review each method and decide which is best for you as a merchant. Option One FullPay is the most automated of the three choices. All order data is collected and provided to the merchants in online reports. The merchant does not have to have a secure web server nor do they need any Internet Security expertise. With FullPay the merchant collects the product information and sends it on the the LinkPoint Payment Gateway. Option Two PayPlus can be as automated as FullPay but requires the merchant to collect the consumer data and pass it to the LinkPoint Payment Gateway, the Gateway still collects credit card number and related information to processing the transaction. This assumes a merchant has a secure web server to collect the consumer information. Option Three PayOnly requires the merchant to collect the customer information and order information and store it on the merchants computer. If you are a merchant but you don’t want to record all the data but instead you want to use the LinkPoint HTML reports for managing your business than you should not use PayOnly. PayOnly, only collects credit card number, date, time, dollar amount, expiration date, and billing zip code. That is the only information that will be inserted into the reports. All three options follow the data flow in the picture below. Customer shops on merchants website Consumer clicks "Buy Now&Payment Gateway The LinkPoint gateway collects additional payment information and forwards the data to the transaction engine to process the transaction The LinkPoint Secure Payment Gateway responds to the consumer with an approved or declined authorization code The consumer clicks "continue" and links back to the merchant website Answers to Technical Questions 1. How does the merchant receive their initial password? Each merchant receives a welcome e-mail with specific "Getting Started" instructions 2. Is the merchant required to change their initial password? The user must complete a password change after the initial log in: The Password Administration screen automatically displays after the initial log in New password cannot be left blank Password is case sensitive Password can be from 1 to 20 characters long Upon successful password change, the merchant must click "OK" and re-login using their new password Any immediate operation within the LinkPoint system prior to re-login will provide the user an "authorization failure request" 3. What is required in the Order Number field? The following are characteristics of the Order Number field for consumer credit card or eCheck payments: Is not a required field If user enters number that already exists, an error message will be given If left blank, will be automatically generated based on user's IP address and current date Cannot contain the following characters: #, ', `, %, +, &, ", spaces or tabs Can be up to 30 characters long The following are characteristics of the Order Number field for purchasing card payments: Is a required field Must be entered by the merchant Must be supplied by the buyer What is required in the Customer Name field? The following are characteristics of the Customer Name field: Is a required field Can contain any characters including space, tab, etc. The single quote character will be changed to a single quote character Up to 30 characters long For consumer cards only Not required for purchasing card What is required in the Customer Address field? The following are characteristics of the Customer Address field: Is a required field Consists of two lines - only one of the two lines is required The double quote character will be changed to a single back quote character Up to 30 characters for each line For consumer cards only Not required for Purchasing card What is required in the City field? The following are characteristics of the City field: Is a required field The single quote character will be changed to a single back quote character Up to 30 characters For consumer cards only Not required for Purchasing card What is required in the Zip field? The following are characteristics of the Zip field: Is a required field Exactly 5 numeric characters What is required in the Phone Number field? The following are characteristics of the Phone Number field: Is not a required field (optional) The single quote character will be changed to a single back quote character Up to 20 characters What is required in the Fax Number field? The following are characteristics of the Fax Number field: Is not a required field (optional) The single quote character will be changed to a single back quote character Up to 20 characters What is required in the Comments field? The following are characteristics of the Comments field: Is not a required field Up to 256 characters Great way to leave a personalize message to customers What is required in the E-mail field? The following are characteristics of the E-mail field: Is not a required field (optional) Must be in the format: yourname @<host>.com, net, .org, etc Only the validity of the format is verified, not the actual e-mail address Can not contain any spaces between characters Only one e-mail address can be specified Up to 45 characters What is required in the State field? The following are characteristics of the State field: Is a required field (consumer cards only) Users have a choice of the 50 states plus D.C. What is required in the Credit Card number field? The following are characteristics of the Credit Card Number field: Is a required field Range: 13 to 20 characters or 13 - 16 digits Allows digits, spaces and dashes only What is required in the Credit Card Expiration date field? The following are characteristics of the Expiration date field: Is a required field Month: 01 to 12 Year: choice of 6 years.  Current year + 5 What is required in the Reference Number field (applies to ticket only)? The following are characteristics of the Reference Number field: Is a required field Can contain any characters, but should always be alphanumeric Up to 6 characters What is required in the Amount field? The following are characteristics of the Amount field: Is a required field Must be real number from 1.00 to 30000.00 Can contain + and preceding 0’s Will be rounded to 2 digits after the decimal point Up to 6 characters 4. How are transactions post-authorized and settled? The merchant retains full responsibility to submit a Ticket Only transaction.   Administration tool and access reports in order to post-authorize and settle the transactions. 5. How long is a post-authorization valid? Post-authorization reserves funds for varying periods, depending on the issuing credit card company’s policy.  A post-authorization can be valid for as little as three days or as long as several months.  For your protection, we strongly recommend that you confirm shipment as soon as possible after pre-authorization.

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