Some Cart Details Missing from IPN

IPN should include vars like item_name_1

[blawton]

My IPN data gets VERIFIED, but it is missing the shopping cart variables. The return URL does include them, but buyers have skipped that too many times. The IPN doc, Order Management Integration Guide, page 55, that item_name_1 and others are IPN vars.

Here is the exact set of vars actually getting verified via IPN.

payer_id='sanitized'
verify_sign='sanitized'
residence_country='US'
txn_id='sanitized'
payment_gross='1.25'
receiver_id='sanitized'
last_name='Lastname'
receiver_email='sanitized%40sanitized.com'
payment_type='instant'
business='sanitized%40sanitized.com'
parent_txn_id='sanitized'
payment_status='Completed'
payer_email='bml%40sanitized.com'
charset='windows-1252'
payment_fee='0.34'
memo='Testing%20IPN%20Note'
notify_version='2.1'
mc_gross='1.25'
payment_date='17%3A29%3A24%20Dec%2003%2C%202006%20PST'
mc_fee='0.34'
payer_status='verified'
mc_currency='USD'
first_name='Firstname'
cmd=_notify-validate 'https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr'
result: VERIFIED

What can cause the cart vars to be excluded from IPN and only sent with the return URL?

Thanks,
Bruce

[axgrindr]

I recently went through all of this on two of my new sites. I have no idea how to set it up (sorry) but the programmer I hired worked this specific issue.
He somehow got it to show the multiple items that were being added to the cart, both online for the customers during the order process and in the Paypal email receipts.
What I can help with is the merchants not using the 'return to merchant' button. We were having the same problem and pretty much solved it by,

1. Changing the text on the return button itself from 'Return to Merchant' to 'Click Here to Download Your Order' (or whatever might be appropriate).

2. Using the custom logo banner space at the top of the Paypal order page to place a prominent warning that says something like 'Please do not close this window. Your order is not complete until you return to the merchant website and download your order'.

3. Implementing the automatic return to merchant on the Paypal orders. The 'no Paypal credit card' orders have a different receipt screen and cannot use automatic return to merchant.

This got rid of literally 99% of our incomplete orders through Paypal.
You need to fix the listing of items problem though for the 1% that do not hit the return to merchant button.

[blawton]

Thanks for the helpful ideas. I have turned on auto-return and expect it will reduce the number of incomplete orders. People can still close their browser window, though. So I really would like to make payment and order completion be directly connected.

I'm beginning to think it has to do with PayPal-hosted shopping carts versus third-party shopping carts ( the _cart approach). Maybe PayPal only passes PayPal-hosted shopping cart data to IPN?

Bruce