What is Shopify Test Payments?
$32.76 billion: it’s the amount of GMV (Gross Payments Volume) processed through Shopify Payments in Q3 of 2023 (before Black Friday and Christmas).
According to recent statistics, Shopify Pay has a market share of 53.47% in the online payments-processing market.
If you have a Shopify store, you should know that e-commerce success begins with a seamless payment process. You don’t want to lose customers because your checkout is not optimized or because it has glitches or bugs.
In fact, the payment step is the most delicate one in the customer journey, since your customers are finally interested in buying from you. But at the same time, if you don’t offer a trustworthy payment process, you will lose a lot of customers in the future.
That’s why offering excellent customer service in the checkout process is fundamental. Testing payments is a crucial step to ensure a glitch-free customer experience.
This is why Shopify has created “Shopify Test Payments”, a feature in Shopify that helps you ensure that whenever a customer has purchased a product, the payment can go through smoothly.
However, for anyone new to Shopify, testing payments on it can be a little confusing.
In this guide, we'll explore the best practices for Shopify test payments.
But before doing that, you should learn about the platform that enables testing: Shopify payments.
Discovering Shopify Payments
Shopify Payments is an integrated payment solution offered by Shopify that allows merchants to accept debit and credit card payments directly through their online stores. By using Shopify Payments, you can streamline your payment processing, simplify the checkout experience for your customers, and benefit from competitive transaction rates.
Shopify Payments supports major credit cards, including Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover. It also enables acceptance of alternative payment methods like Google Pay and Apple Pay, enhancing convenience for your customers.
In addition to supporting major credit cards and alternative payment methods, Shopify Payments also offers advanced fraud detection tools. These tools help merchants identify and prevent fraudulent transactions, protecting both their business and their customers.
Furthermore, Shopify Payments offers merchants detailed transaction reporting and analytics. This allows you to gain insights into your sales performance, track revenue trends, and make data-driven decisions to optimize your online store’s profitability.
Why Test Payments on Shopify?
Before diving into the process, let's understand why testing payments on Shopify is essential:
Customer Trust
A smooth payment process builds trust, enhancing the overall customer experience.
Testing helps you identify and address potential issues before they affect your customers’ experience, ultimately reducing cart abandonment rates and maximizing conversion rates.
Another great way to gain customer trust is to offer them an always-available live chat or chatbot to help them solve their checkout problems.
As the motto says: “You don't have a second occasion to make a first great impression”.
If you’re trying to improve your customer service and automate customer support, TextYess is the perfect solution for you!
Avoiding Glitches
Identifying and resolving payment glitches in advance prevents potential revenue loss.
It helps ensure that your payment system is functioning correctly and securely.
That’s why you should regularly update and patch your Shopify store and payment-related apps to mitigate any potential security vulnerability.
Compliance
Ensuring compliance with payment regulations and standards is crucial for a secure online shopping environment. It allows you to verify that transactions are being processed accurately and that funds are being deposited into your designated account.
Before testing Shopify Payments
Before we dive in, make sure you've already set up Shopify Payments.
If you haven't, no worries, just follow this video's instructions to get it set up or visit the Shopify Help Center.
Before testing you should know that…
Here are three key points that you should always remember when you start testing payments on Shopify.
1. Test Mode Limitations
Remember, while in test mode, you and your customers can't use real credit cards for orders. So, don't enable test mode on a live store.
2. Avoid Fulfilling Test Orders
Don't fulfill any test orders. You'll be charged for shipping labels, even if they're for a test order. Disable any auto-fulfillment apps beforehand.
3. Transactions in Test ModeTransactions won't show up in your payouts or reports while in test mode.
3 methods to test payments on Shopify
Now that you know why it is so crucial to test payments in Shopify, let us look at some of the available methods to test that.
- Using the “Shopify_payment_capture” gem: The Shopify_payment_capture gem is great for testing purposes as it allows you to actually process the payments without having to go through the entire checkout process. This is quicker and easier as one can test the scenario quickly without doing the entire process. If you would like to know about it, visit Shopify Help Center.
- Using the Shopify sandbox: Shopify also offers a sandbox environment that can be used to test new features. This can also be used to test payments without affecting the actual environment.
- Using test mode: Test mode is a new feature of Shopify Payments and is the most widely used. It is used to test how customers can pay for their orders and, later, how those orders are processed.
Once the test mode is activated in your environment, real credit cards can’t be used for payments. Along with that, some local payment methods, such as iDEAL and Sofort, become unavailable in the checkout stage, and hence, you must ensure that test mode has not been activated in your production environment.
Once you are done testing, you can simply deactivate the test mode so that real credit cards can be used further.
Ok let’s say you want to use “test mode”, keep reading to discover how to set it up.
As mentioned, you need to enable “Test mode” in Shopify payments before you start creating test orders. Below are the steps that demonstrate how can you enable test mode.
Test Shopify Payments with this 5-step process
Ok, it’s finally time to set up the test. Here is the 5-step process on how you do it.
1. Access Shopify Admin & Enable Test Payment:
Log in to your Shopify admin panel to initiate the testing process.
Click on Settings, then Payments, and finally click on “Manage” .
If you don't see this option, it means you haven't set up Shopify Payments yet.
Then disable any Accelerated payment options like Apple Pay, or Google Pay. This will streamline the testing process.
After that, scroll down to Test Mode, check the box for Enable Test Mode, and click Save.
By having a separate environment, you can test different scenarios and perform various experiments without any impact on your customers or live operations.
2. Test Successful Payments:
Simulating a range of scenarios is essential to assess the robustness of your payment system.
Start by heading to your online store's landing page or one of your products’ pages.
Add an item to your cart and proceed to checkout, mimicking the actions of a customer. Fill in all the necessary details, covering shipping and billing details.
At the payment step, select the appropriate test payment method, like Shopify Payments, and input the provided test credit card numbers.
Shopify provides test credit card numbers for each major credit card provider. These allow you to test payments on Shopify, without the need to spend any actual money.
Follow the prompts and… et voila!
You'll receive a confirmation page and email, confirming the success of the simulated transaction.
To simulate a successful transaction, you can use the following information when the credit card details are asked at checkout.
- Name on card: Enter at least any two words.
- Security code: Enter any three digits.
- Expiry date: Enter any date that lies in the future.
Card number: Use any of the following numbers taken from Shopify Card Payments Test Data.
3. Monitoring and Troubleshooting
But the job is not finished.
First of all, you should check Transaction Logs: this involves verifying that funds are being correctly processed, deposited, and recorded in your Shopify admin dashboard.
To ensure accurate transaction processing, review your Shopify admin dashboard regularly. Check the “Orders” and “Payment” sections for each test order you created.
Verify that payment information, including transaction amounts, card details, and payment statuses, are accurately captured.
Secondly, during the testing process for Shopify Payments, you may encounter common issues that require troubleshooting. Let's explore these issues and provide effective tips for resolution:
- Card Declined Errors
If a test payment is declined, double-check the test credit card details for accuracy.
Deliberately use one of the provided test credit cards to simulate a declined transaction and validate your system's response.
- Missing Funds in Payouts
If funds are not deposited during testing, ensure correct payout settings.
Review Shopify Payments settings and verify the accuracy of the designated bank account information.
- Payment Statuses Not Updating
Allow some time for payment status updates in your Shopify admin dashboard.
If issues persist, contact Shopify support for assistance.
Ok, it’s time to move on!
4. Test failed transactions
Now, let's explore how to test failed transactions on Shopify Payments.
If you want to view the credit card error messages that might be displayed to a customer during checkout, then you can use these test credit card numbers to simulate different failed transactions.
- Card Declined Message: Use credit card number 4000000000000002 during checkout to simulate a declined transaction.
- Incorrect Number Message: Use credit card number 4242424242424241 to generate an incorrect number message.
- Disputed Transaction: Simulate a disputed transaction by using credit card number 4000000000000259.
- Invalid Expiry Month Message: Enter an invalid expiry month, such as 13, to generate a corresponding error message.
- Invalid Expiry Year Message: Use an expiry year in the past to simulate an invalid expiry year message.
Invalid Security Code Message: Use a two-digit security code number to generate an invalid security code message.
5. Disable Shopify Payments Test Mode
Ok, you tested it all!
Once you've finished testing, go back to Settings in your Shopify Admin, click on Payments, and then “Manage” in the Shopify Payments section. It’s time to “go back in time” and bring your account to the step 1 moment!
Scroll down to Test Mode, uncheck Enable test mode, and if you disabled accelerated checkouts, you can re-enable them now.
Click Save to finish up.
Conclusion
In conclusion, mastering Shopify test payments is crucial for e-commerce success, considering the platform's significant market share and the billions processed through Shopify Payments.
A seamless payment process builds customer trust, reduces cart abandonment, and maximizes conversions.
And remember to always offer a great customer experience when it comes down to payments.
Shopify Payments, with its integrated features and fraud detection tools, streamlines payment processing in the best way possible for your online store.
Before testing, correct setup and understanding key points like test mode limitations are essential.
This Shopify test payments feature ensures smooth test mode setup, allowing the simulation of successful transactions. Thanks to this guide you’re finally able to use it to optimize your payment processes.
Remember to test failed transactions, monitor transaction logs, and troubleshoot common issues like card declines. Ongoing monitoring and testing are necessary for accurate transaction processing.
Continuous optimization builds customer trust and ensures a secure shopping experience. Happy testing!