Gift certificates work like a payment method. As an example, they allow Pressero subscribers to offer credit for purchases made on storefronts by having the site user enter a code, similar to promotions, and then pay the balance on an integrated on non-integrated payment method. They can be easily redeemed to a site-user account via a generated link, or at checkout.
Showing some love to your current customers is easier than ever by generating a single gift certificate or a whole batch to keep customers coming back to your print shop.
There are multiple ways to benefit from using gift certificates, allowing customers more flexibility to finalize orders, making it easier to purchase from your stores!
Gift Certificate properties
- Code
- A string of customizable characters that have a randomly generated component.
- Must be unique per site but can be repeated for different sites.
- The auto generated part of the code will never contain "i" or "o" (lower or upper case) to avoid confusion when reading it. These letters are easily confused with "L" and zero.
- The auto generated part of the code will never contain symbols.
- Symbols can be added to the prefix or suffix of the code.
- Link
- A link generated with the code that allows the customer to access the site and redeem the gift certificate automatically.
- Assigned User(optional)
- The customer to which the gift certificate is assigned.
- The user can be defined when the gift certificate is created or will be automatically assigned when the customer redeems the gift certificate through the generated link, checkout page, or customer profile.
- Apply to
- Where the gift certificate can be applied. There are three options for that:
- Shipping: Can be used to pay only for shipping costs on the cart;
- Subtotal: Will be used to deduct from subtotal of the cart;
- Total: Will be used to deduct from the total value of the cart;
- Amount / Initial Amount
- The value, using the site's currency.
- Current Balance
- The current balance, using the site's currency.
- The balance changes based on usage and is tracked within the system.
- Expiration
- The expiration date and time.
- The gift certificate is inactive after the expiration date passes.
- If no expiration date is provided, then the gift certificate does not expire.
How to enable Gift Certificates on Storefront
In order to keep the checkout page as clean and simple as possible when not used Gift certificates do not show automatically. But you can create, edit, update and delete Gift Certificates in admin at any time.
Use this checkbox to enable on storefront. Admin > Site > Site Settings > Checkout Panel
Gift Certificate Site Options
- Show Gift Certificates on Storefront
- This will show gift certificate functionality for the storefront checkout page and on user profile.
- Gift Certificate Prompt
- If this is left blank, it will use "Gift Certificate".
- Use this to change the Gift Certificate name in the following areas of the storefront.
- Checkout page summary sidebar. Placeholder for the input and total text.
- Storefront user profile page, inside the gift certificate tab, the placeholder for the input and the button to add a gift certificate.
- Gift Certificates Section Prompt
- If this is left blank, it will use "Gift Certificates".
- Use this to change the Gift Certificate name in the following areas of the storefront.
- Storefront user profile page gift certificate tab name.
- Checkout page gift certificate payment section name.
- Allow non-integrated payment methods with Gift Certificates
- Check this item if you want to use the Gift certificate with non-integrated payment methods.
Managing Gift Certificates
Go to Sites > [Site name] > Gift Certificates.
Editing a Gift Certificate
To edit an existing gift certificate, click on the pencil icon to edit all the gift certificate options. If the gift certificate was not yet used by the customer, it is possible to edit all the properties.
If it was already used then the admin user won't be able to change the assigned user, gift certificate type or code.
Notice that when a gift certificate has been used that the transaction history of the gift certificate will show.
After completing all the changes press the Save button on the bottom of the page or the Cancel button to undo all the unsaved changes.
Deleting a Gift Certificate
To delete a gift certificate click on the pencil icon next to the gift certificate code and once on the edit page click on the Delete buttom on the right bottom of the page.
Deleted gift certificates are not listed by default on the gift certificate list. To see them check the Include deleted checkbox on the top right of the page.
Adding Gift Certificates
Creating gift certificates can be done individually or in bulk.
- Single
- Creates a single gift certificate. This allows the admin user to set all gift certificate properties, including assigning it to a specific customer.
- Multiple
- It is possible to set the amount, expiration and type but not assign it to any user.
- Once you generate a list of gift certificates it's easy to check the codes and edit before actually saving all these codes to the main gift certificate list.
- All gift certificates created through this method must be redeemed by code or link.
- NOTE: Creating a large number of gift certificates is easy but deleting them are done individually so please be sure that the generated gift certificates are correct before saving.
Gift Certificate Code Generation Details
A gift certificate code is required, and it must have a random component to it. Pressero offers some customization to it, all optional.
Prefix and suffix, as the name says, adds a prefix or suffix to the randomly generated code. It is also possible to make the code numbers only, letters only or all uppercase.
By default, the randomly generated component of the gift certificate will contain both numbers and letters.
It is possible to click the Generate button as many times as desired before saving a single gift certificate or in bulk. Each time will create a new code and link.
Redeeming gift certificates
There are 3 ways for a customer to redeem and use a gift certificate.
- Gift certificate link
- Customer profile page.
- Checkout page.
Note: Guest users cannot use or redeem gift certificates. Gift certificates need to be assigned to an account in order to be used and tracked.
Gift Certificate Link
When a gift certificate is created by an admin user a link is created along with it. This link can be sent to the customer by email or any other preferred method. The link always follows this format: {siteDomain}/gc?code={giftCertificateCode}.
The link is designed to take the user directly to their profile page and apply the gift certificate with no need to enter in the code.
Users will be required to create an account or login in order for the gift certificate to be redeemed. After that the gift certificate will be displayed on their profile page.
Customer Profile Page
A customer can also redeem a gift certificate through their profile page using the add gift certificate input.
The user must type or paste the gift certificate code inside the textbox on the top and click Add gift certificate. If all validations are passed the gift certificate will be displayed on the list bellow and also listed on the checkout page.
Checkout Page
The third option is to redeem the gift certificate directly during checkout. On the checkout page the customer may enter the gift certificate code to redeem it and automatically apply it to the order by clicking the Add & Apply button. This will display under the promotional code area as well.
Applying Gift Certificates to Orders
When a gift certificate, or multiple gift certificates, are part of a user's account they will show in a list on the checkout page above the payment method section.
In this list the user can apply one, or multiple gift certificates to their order. The total of gift certificates will show in the summary sidebar.
Gift Certificate Deductions Policy
The order in which the customer applies the gift certificates matters.
If the sum of the applied gift certificates exceeds the total amount of the gift certificate the exceeding value will be returned from the last to the first selected gift certificate applied.
For example
The customer has 3 gift certificates that applies to the Total of the cart.
- GC1 - $5.00
- GC2 - $10.00
- GC3 - $3.00
The cart total is $17.00.
If the customer applies the gift certificates in this order (GC1 -> GC2 -> GC3) then
- GC1 remaining balance will be $0.00
- GC2 remaining balance will be $0.00
- GC3 remaining balance will be $1.00
If the customer applies the gift certificates in this order (GC3 -> GC2 -> GC1) then
- GC3 remaining balance will be $0.00
- GC2 remaining balance will be $0.00
- GC1 remaining balance will be $1.00
Adding gift certificate information to "New Order" customized emails
By default, the Gift Certificate information will be added to the default "New order" email template, there is no need to change it. But if the subscriber uses a customized email template for new orders it must be edited to add the gift certificate information.
To do that there are 2 new variables available to be added:
- ##GIFT_CERTIFICATE_LABEL## : This is the text for the gift certificate field on the email. It reflects the Gift Certificates Section Prompt option on the site settings.
- ##ORDER_GIFT_CERTIFICATE## : The amount paid by gift certificates during checkout.
Adding gift certificate/payment information to custom skin order complete/summary page
Note: If you are not using a custom skin, you do not need any changes to get the new payment information to be added to your order complete/summary page
We have added a new skin tag ###PAYMENTS### for the order summary page. It will list the payments and gift certificate usage for the current order.
Example:
1. Open your "ordersummarylayout.txt" skin file.
2. Insert ###PAYMENTS### below the ###ORDEREDBY###
Then your order complete/summary page would be able to display the payment information like below