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URGENT: "Error #36. Transaction failed…"

Home Forums Community Forum URGENT: "Error #36. Transaction failed…"

This topic contains 15 replies, has 4 voices. Last updated by  Cristián Lávaque 4 years, 4 months ago.

Topic Author Topic
Posted: Wednesday Aug 15th, 2012 at 1:36 pm #22137
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

Please help ASAP

Several members have sent us this message today.

“Error #36. Transaction failed: Fail to obtain approval for the online transaction.”

Logging is enabled. PayPal Account Details are configured. And PayFlow Account Details are configured.

Here’s the kind of day we’re having trying to keep our paying members happy:

Date: Wed, Aug 15, 2012 at 9:08 AM
Subject: Unable to sign up
This is what I get when I try to sign up to paypal.
Error #36. Transaction failed: Fail to obtain approval for the online transaction.
My account is fine. This has been happening for 2 weeks now.

Date: Wed, 15 Aug 2012 11:51:26 +0000
Subject: I need to renew my membership. Please call me.
Hi…
It’s me again. And, once again, I am writing to you letting you know that I cannot get the website to take my money. Not with PayPal, nor AmEx. I get alllll the way to the end of each transaction and each time I get denied. “Failure” message. Every. Single. Time.
I want to renew my membership. More than anything. I have my credit card number memorized and will gladly share it with you over the phone if someone would call me on my cell phone.
Please. Help me.

Date: Wed, Aug 15, 2012 at 7:43 AM
Subject: Re: membership
Hi Guys,
I tried to renew my membership on the new website today and the transaction failed 3 times. I tried paypal twice and amex once. to no avail.

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Viewing 15 replies - 1 through 15 (of 15 total)
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Posted: Wednesday Aug 15th, 2012 at 2:45 pm #22143
Eduan
Username: Eduan
Moderator

Hello Mark,

Could you please share the resulting logs? Please remember to put them between the code tags. ;)

Posted: Wednesday Aug 15th, 2012 at 3:23 pm #22148
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

Thank you for the fast response Eduan,

I went through three log files. The data is sensitive so I can’t post all of the content here.

The three logs (from …/wp-content/plugins/s2member-logs) were:

  • paypal-ipn.log
  • paypal-payflow-api.log
  • paypal-payflow-ipn.log

Log file: paypal-payflow-ipn.log

No errors


Log file: paypal-payflow-api.log

145 approvals and 75 transaction failures [note: “DAMN”!]

62 of these failed transactions had this in common:

Transaction failed: Fail to obtain approval for the online transaction
Referral: 10422-The customer must return to PayPal to select new funding sources.

I didn’t see a common thread with the 145 successful transactions.


Log file: paypal-ipn.log

ERROR: PHP v5.2.17 :: WordPress® v3.4.1 :: s2Member® v120703 :: s2Member® Pro v120703
http://www.domain.com/?s2member_paypal_notify=1&s2member_paypal_proxy=paypal&s2member_paypal_proxy_use=pro-emails,subscr-signup-as-subscr-payment&s2member_paypal_proxy_verification=xxxxxxxx&s2member_paypal_proxy_return_url=

User-Agent: WordPress/3.4.1; http://www.domain.com
0 => ‘Unable to verify $_POST vars. This is most likely related to an invalid configuration of s2Member, or a problem with server compatibility.’,
1 => ‘If you\’re absolutely SURE that your configuration is valid, you may want to run some tests on your server, just to be sure $_POST variables are populated, and that your server is able to connect/communicate with your Payment Gateway over an HTTPS connection.’,
3 => ‘Please see this thread: `http://www.s2member.com/forums/topic/ideal-server-configuration-for-s2member/` for details regarding the ideal server configuration for s2Member.’,
4 => ‘array (
\’payer_email\’ => \’syntaxterror7@gmail.com\’, < <<<<<<<[Chris]< This may also be a problem with one of the failed 62 transactions.


So if we’ve got “…an invalid configuration of s2Member, or a problem with server compatibility,” it’s inconsistent with about a 40% failure rate.

Posted: Wednesday Aug 15th, 2012 at 4:50 pm #22157
Eduan
Username: Eduan
Moderator

OK Mark, thanks for that.

Could you please try the following file?:
http://www.s2member.com/wp-content/downloads/s2member-file-download-key-135fd23826b5c45b06ab41828027a8c5/s2m-server-check.zip

Upload it to your WordPress directory and open it in a browser:
http://www.yourwebsite.com/s2m-server-check.php

Make sure that it’s a PHP file and not a zip file. ;)

Please if possible show a screenshot of the results, remember there are several pages. :)

Posted: Wednesday Aug 15th, 2012 at 10:14 pm #22170
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

Here’s the screenshot.

Here it is in plain text:
Congratulations, you have PHP v5.3.2-1ubuntu4.14 installed!
Your server IS fully compatible with s2Member® Pro.
— Good to go! ( visit s2Member.com )

You said it was several pages… but that’s all that it displayed.

  • This reply was modified 4 years, 4 months ago by  Mark R..
Posted: Thursday Aug 16th, 2012 at 7:52 am #22205

Mark, this is a newer server check script, could you try it too? http://www.s2member.com/r/server-check-tool/

Could you double check that PayFlow settings are configured correctly? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0jOq2MRTVQ

Could you please send the log files, or FTP login to see them complete? s2Member® » Private Contact Form

Thanks!

Posted: Thursday Aug 16th, 2012 at 11:04 am #22248
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

Here are the results from the last test (all PASSed].

While we do feel like we set up PayFlow correctly (remember – it works 60% of the time), I’ll be happy to review it one more time. Since the last time this error came up on the forum, a fix that you supplied seem to work for the majority of them. We were thinking that might be the case here…

We’ll send the log files as well.

Posted: Friday Aug 17th, 2012 at 9:02 am #22338

Thanks. I got your email. I’ll forward this to Jason to review it.

Posted: Friday Aug 17th, 2012 at 1:15 pm #22373
Staff Member
Details received. Thank you.
~ Investigating now.
Posted: Friday Aug 17th, 2012 at 1:41 pm #22378
Staff Member

Investigation completed.

I’m finding that your log files contain several references to these two Payflow errors.

Error #36. Transaction failed: Fail to obtain approval for the online transaction.
Error #1. User authentication failed: Recurring Billing

These two errors, while appearing somewhat different, both indicate the same thing. It appears from our inspection of your log files that record communication between s2Member and the PayPal Payflow API, that your PayPal account is currently not setup to allow for recurring transactions.

Here are possible solutions:

1. Try removing all of your Payflow configuration options from the s2Member Dashboard panel, in hopes that your current PayPal Pro account will work without it. Not all PayPal accounts are designed to work with the Payflow API.

If you are absolutely sure that you’ve already setup Recurring Billing service with PayPal, this might be the problem. So, you can try disabling Payflow integration by removing the s2Member configuration options for Payflow. This places s2Member back into a normal PayPal Payments Pro integration, which still allows for the processing of recurring transactions, but under a different API (i.e. the PayPal Pro API, instead of the Payflow API).

However, please note that you will still need to have a PayPal Pro account setup which supports the PayPal Recurring Billing service, regardless of which API s2Member is working with, Recurring Billing service must be enabled.

2. Contact PayPal to ensure that your current Payflow API supports Recurring Billing service.

Please let us know if problems persist.

Posted: Saturday Aug 18th, 2012 at 12:51 am #22412
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

Jason and Cristián,

Thank you for the support and responses.

We’re actively working with you and PayPal (at a DefCon 5 level) because we’re loosing members and the goodwill we’ve worked so hard to earn and keep with our membership.

From the above suggestions. “…removing all of your Payflow configuration options from the s2Member Dashboard panel, in hopes that your current PayPal Pro account will work without it,” and “…regardless of which API s2Member is working with, Recurring Billing service must be enabled,” it sounds like we should chose only one option in s2M. It seems we should chose either PayPal Pro, or PayFlow–but not both. Is this true?

If we gave 2sM admin access to our PayPal account, then s2M would be the one party with full access to all three sides of this issue (Our WP, S2M, and PayPal). If s2M could work in a “PayPal partnership” arrangement then s2M would be able to offer a higher level service agreement to its customers–and with a backstage pass to PayPal, s2M would be able to see all the settings and line them up so everything would work–every time.

This full access could enable s2M to further develop the s2M app so the app could use our PayPal credentials, log into PayPal on the app side, and coordinate s2M and PayPal settings. Then s2M would become a “one click” app by us and all other s2M/PayPal users. That one seems fairly obvious–but at the same time I fully understand implementing it would not be easy.

An app that could do that would/could/should eliminate the payment problems we’re experiencing now. And if that app gave s2M customers a high level service agreement option, the app could be called the s2Member Edge because it would give s2M a huge edge over all other competitors with WordPress:PayPal transaction management.

Another fitting name for this advanced app would be s2Member Utopia :)

Sincerely,

Pollyanna

Posted: Saturday Aug 18th, 2012 at 1:21 am #22414
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

An add on note:

It seems from your recommendations above that in s2M we should only use PayPal Pro or PayPal PayFlow–but not both.

Is that accurate?

Posted: Saturday Aug 18th, 2012 at 12:15 pm #22456
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

Jason,

As you predicted – PayPal did have something messed up on their side. They corrected it, and at the same time, I did remove the settings that the above video said to set. It does appear to work (no errors on the client side), but then again – I don’t see the charge on the PayPal side either.

It doesn’t help anyone that PayPal keeps changing their nomenclature and product names. The S2M demo video doesn’t seem to apply at all anymore and should probably either be taken down or updated).

We’ll keep testing – thanks for your continued help!

Posted: Sunday Aug 19th, 2012 at 8:25 am #22489

Thanks for the update, Mark. We’ll look forward to your new updates.

It seems from your recommendations above that in s2M we should only use PayPal Pro or PayPal PayFlow–but not both.

As you said, their nomenclature doesn’t help at all. There is the PayFlow Pro service, and then there PayPal Pro PayFlow Edition, both separate services… s2Member integrates with PayPal Pro, either the older version that uses the PayPal Pro API, or the newer that uses the PayFlow API.

What Jason meant earlier was that perhaps your account doesn’t use the PayFlow API, so you wouldn’t use the integration panel for it in s2Member’s PayPal Options page.

Either way, PayPal Pro using the PayPal Pro or PayFlow API, if you’re selling subscriptions, you’ll need to get the recurring payments service activated, which is extra, so make sure you have it.

I hope that helps understand it better.

Posted: Wednesday Aug 22nd, 2012 at 6:49 pm #22789
Mark R.
Username: marktyt

It does – and you’re right… PayPal’s naming scheme is horrible. I still don’t know for sure which one is actually working – but the fact remains it does work. So I’m not going to touch anything. :) Thanks again for your help!

Posted: Thursday Aug 23rd, 2012 at 7:54 am #22843

No problem, glad I could help and that it’s working! :)

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