Notice: Verisign missing orders - Check your manager

[julie_thompson]

Hi everyone,

I thought I was losing my mind when I saw that I had orders in my MIVA Merchant Open Orders section but were missing in the Verisign Manager. :eek:

Verisign confirmed I am not losing my mind, and that in fact there are missing transactions. Apparently it is a system wide Verisign issue, and Verisign confirmed that possibly all Verisign merchants are missing transactions. They do not have an ETA on when it will be corrected. The gentleman I spoke with at Verisign said they don't know if the missing transactions will appear once the issue is resolved, or if they will need to be rerun. He also said they don't know if I run it again, if it would double auth or not, since they don't know if the first auth is viable or not. I asked if they had any idea when this would be resolved, he said they hoped today, but it could be longer.

Just thought I'd give everyone who uses Verisign as their payment gateway a heads up that if the missing order in Verisign is not viable, that even if it appears to be batched within your admin, that the transaction may not actually capture.

[ILoveHostasaurus]

We had some reports of their web interface being completely down yesterday, with a message reporting:

Verisign Payments site functionality is currently unavailable. We are working on the issue and apologize for any inconvenience

They seemed to still be processing transactions at the time though.

Of course now that we use a forum, most people will probably not see this message before the problem has been corrected. :)

[ILoveHostasaurus]

PayPal posted some info about this: http://www.verisign.com/support/advisories/page_delay_settlements.html

[julie_thompson]

Sigh....

Verisign (well, PayPal... {cringe}) sent an e-mail yesterday concerning the missing transactions/batches. My first missing transaction was on Monday May 15th. It is only now they are notifying their customers?!?!?

Yesterday I had ANOTHER "select failure" transaction and my customer is PO'd. The following is her e-mail:

"It is my hope that you can reverse the second charge right away. Please let me know that you have started this process to correct your error in charging me twice for the rice cooker."

This does not bode well when trying to establish good customer relations when my customers assume I double charged them since they see their available funds dwindle twice-over (since it was just a double auth due to the Select Failure).

I am about -- this -- close to screaming about Verisign. From what I've read, Auth Net is not much better? Not the same issues with Auth Net, but other issues which are just as frustrating, if I remember correctly? Is there really a quality gateway out there? Or is it a pipe dream?

[ILoveHostasaurus]

My theory on select failures is that they happen when it takes too long to authorize, which typically only happens with check cards and some international cards. Check cards are particularly difficult because you can't just authorize under a limit, you have to check the account balance and possibly a daily limit. I've never understood why other gateways do not have this issue but have been equally unsuccessful in finding anyone at Verisign who could explain what a select failure actually is and why they can't resolve it. It only seems to happen to some Payflow Pro users with many never seeing it at all so that's the second thing that is confusing about it.

[Dyna Jim]

I find the vast majority of select failures are connected to debit cards on credit unions. I always ask if it's a phone order and 9 out of 10 it's a credit union debit. Their systems slower or something?

DJ

[ILoveHostasaurus]

I find the vast majority of select failures are connected to debit cards on credit unions. I always ask if it's a phone order and 9 out of 10 it's a credit union debit. Their systems slower or something?

DJ

That might suggest that it's cards that are handled by one specific company that cause this then because most credit cards issued by credit unions are not actually handled by the credit union, since they're too small to have the infrastructure necessary to offer their own credit cards. A very long time ago I used to work for Equifax which acted as the credit union for credit card accounts, from issuance to call center, it later was spun off to a seperate company but they handled thousands of credit unions' card accounts.

[Dyna Jim]

So in essence maybe the small credit unions save money using a cheaper company for their debits card processing. And hence you get what you pay for, and that means slow and select failure?
DJ

[julie_thompson]

I've had select failures with AMEX cards. Even my own AMEX card when trying to replicate the problem.

[ILoveHostasaurus]

Julie, we've seen some customers get the select failure on all card types regularly, they had to switch away from Payflow Pro; other customers never see it. It may have some relation to your merchant account provider too since I have no explanation for why one customer on the same server as another using the same gateway would see the failures all the time and the other never.

[Dyna Jim]

What's strange about it too, is it comes in waves for us. I'll go months without seeing one, and just this week I've had three. No real ryme or reason to it to me. I tried to leave PFP, but Paypal (now verisign) was horrid on getting an order through vs pfp.

It all seems to be a pick your least PITA, not a this just works situation.
DJ

[julie_thompson]

Julie, we've seen some customers get the select failure on all card types regularly, they had to switch away from Payflow Pro;

David, as always, you are so helpful! And I appreciate your expedient replies.

Do you know which gateway your customers switched to? Just wondering as I seem to remember even Auth Net having its share of downtime....

(Not sure which is worse, completely down on a more frequent basis or random select failures...).

It may have some relation to your merchant account provider too since I have no explanation for why one customer on the same server as another using the same gateway would see the failures all the time and the other never.

I use NOVA. Do you know if your select failure customers were using NOVA?

If I had to chose to drop either NOVA or VPFP, it would be Verisign in a heartbeat... NOVA is terrific!

[apanda]

I'm finding this thread late, but I wanted to point out that I use NOVA and do get select failures. However, I don't get them daily like I used to. When I did get them daily, I believe it was partially due to my server, as it was a little low on memory as was lagging a bit. After I upgraded, the select failures decreased significantly. Still, one select failure is too many, especially if it is a debit card user who later checks their account and sees multiple "charges".

Is there a way to determine in Verisign Manager if someone is using a debit card?

[Vic - WolfPaw Computers]

NOVA is the processor, not the payment gateway. So the select failures you see are coming from Verisign's gateway. If that is the case, then NOVA wouldnt even know about the transaction.

The select failure message would have nothing to do with your server or its memory either. It is an error message from the gateway when a specific condition occurs, causing a failure. Unfortunately, no one seems to know what that specific condition is - even at Verisign.

To the payment gateway, a debit card is just like a true credit card. The process in which the money is debited is what is different. I'm sure something in the card alogrithim can identify a true credit card from a debit card - I dont happen to know how to determine that.

I'm finding this thread late, but I wanted to point out that I use NOVA and do get select failures. However, I don't get them daily like I used to. When I did get them daily, I believe it was partially due to my server, as it was a little low on memory as was lagging a bit. After I upgraded, the select failures decreased significantly. Still, one select failure is too many, especially if it is a debit card user who later checks their account and sees multiple "charges".

Is there a way to determine in Verisign Manager if someone is using a debit card?

[apanda]

The select failure message would have nothing to do with your server or its memory either. It is an error message from the gateway when a specific condition occurs, causing a failure. Unfortunately, no one seems to know what that specific condition is - even at Verisign.
In my case, select failures were partially due to the server. I had 10+ select failures a day, then when I upgraded my server, it dropped to 1 or 2, every few days. That's not just a coincidence.

[Dyna Jim]

In my case, select failures were partially due to the server. I had 10+ select failures a day, then when I upgraded my server, it dropped to 1 or 2, every few days. That's not just a coincidence.
Very interesting, come to think of it, since we setup our own server, I've not seen a select failure out of it. Hmm......;)

Jim