Allow for the registration AND payment from within the Troop Track app. As of now, the app does not allow a user to check out the items in their cart.
Unfortunately the ability to pay within the app is very costly, Apple/Google get a 30% cut of the in app purchase fees. Unless there is a change in policy for in-app purchases from Apple/Google TT will not be able to offer payment from within the App. There was discussion recently about sending out an e-mail when items are added to the cart reminding people to complete their transaction in their browser.
Aaron,
Thank you for that update. 30% is far too steep, especially when parents are upset about paying 3-3.5% to cover transaction fees.
I would suggest changing the text of the notification to include mention of payment through the website. Even better, have the “OK” button redirect you to a webpage with the cart. Anything that reduces the friction of payment would be helpful. That is, after all, the point…making it easier to register and pay for events.
All the best.
-Micah
The terms of service for the Apps do not allow any mention of payments outside of the app, or links to outside payment processing, that is why it would have to be an e-mail outside of the App all together, although even that was not allowed until recently. It gets especially annoying when you are not even using the payment processors like PayPal or Stripe and just using the Money account as a ledger to keep track, but all fees are paid in person directly. They don’t have any kind of a mechanism to allow for that while charging for the other types of apps that are really money generating rather than money transferring, TT doesn’t even get any portion of the money from transactions. The only other option for individuals if they really want to be able to do everything all at once would be use their browser on their mobile device and not use the app at all.
The error message in the app should be made more explicit. Currently it says: “In app purchases are not available on the mobile app”.
I would change this to say “Trooptrack payments cannot be made on the app. Login to TroopTrack on a browser to complete your checkout.”
The first user that read the current message just wrote to me and said “I can’t pay for the event on Trooptrack”. It took me a while to figure out that he was using the mobile app. Users just see TroopTrack and they are not making the distinction between app and browser. So I would make the message more explicit so that users understand what they need to do.
@jp1, That is exactly what I proposed to TT admin, unfortunately Apple and Google do not allow even that wording in the app pointing someone to an external payment service. There is discussion in another thread about sending an e-mail out when people add items to their cart to remind them to check out through the website. TT is caught between ease of use in having an App and the rules put in place by the companies that control those app stores. Unfortunately it does then take some communication from the Unit to the participants to let them know what the process is.
Ah. I actually ran into that same problem with Apple professionally when my company launched an app and tried to collect payment outside of the app.
I do like the idea of sending an email to users when they leave an item in a cart without paying. I think that can really effective. I would opt for that to occur after a period of time – maybe 12 or 24 hours in the cart without paying. Although, given the TT payment workflow, I’m not sure if that’s possible.
Until then, I’ll try to handle this with communication within our troop.
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