X-Cart:Gift Certificates

What Gift Certificates module does

Gift Certificates module enables gift certificates in your store. A gift certificate is a popular type of present for family and friends. It is a thing believed to be the perfect gift in situations where a person wants to get the recipient something thoughtful, but doesn't know what he or she wants.

In terms of X-Cart, a gift certificate is a unique code (distributed on paper or electronically) that is recognized by the store as a means of exchange (not currency, but a substitute for currency; evidence that its holder is entitled to receive products for a definite sum of money). Such a code is issued by the store automatically in response to a request from a customer. The response is submitted in the form of a regular order (In other words, a gift certificate is purchased in the same way as any product in the store).

A customer who purchases a gift certificate configures it using the 'Gift certificates' section of the Customer interface (Special menu->Gift certificates): specifies the name of the person who is sending the certificate and the name of the certificate recipient, creates a message for the recipient, chooses an amount of money for which the certificate must be issued, specifies, whether the certificate should be delivered by email or by regular (postal) mail, and provides the recipient's address (according to the selected delivery option).

As soon as the task of configuring the gift certificate is finished, the customer adds the certificate to the shopping cart and orders it as if it were a regular product.

After the order with the gift certificate gets processed, the certificate is activated and sent to the recipient specified by the certificate purchaser.

The recipient then uses the code specified in the gift certificate to redeem the gift certificate - that is to say, to pay for any order in your store by the gift certificate (fully - if the amount on the gift certificate equals or exceeds the total amount of the order, or partially - if the amount on the gift certificate is smaller than the total amount of the order).

Note: The only limitation is that orders containing nothing but gift certificates cannot be paid for by a gift certificate.

To redeem a gift certificate, a person simply needs to select 'Gift Certificate' as a method of payment on checkout:

and enter the certificate code into a special field in the 'Payment details' form:

Any holder of a gift certificate has the ability to check the current amount and status of his or her gift certificate by using X-Cart's gift certificate verification service. The remaining balance and the status of a gift certificate can be found out at any time by entering the certificate code into the 'Gift certificate verification' form.

Roles in Gift Certificates module management

If you are an X-Cart GOLD administrator/provider or an X-Cart PRO administrator:

• You can enable/disable and configure the module Gift Certificates (See #Enabling and Configuring 'Gift Certificates').
• You can create gift certificates (Check out #Creating Gift Certificates).
• You can manage existing gift certificates (Check out #Managing Gift Certificates):

- view/edit gift certificate details,

- change gift certificate statuses,

- print gift certificates,

- delete gift certificates.

• You can change the design of printable gift certificates by editing gift certificate templates (See #Gift Certificate Templates for details).