How to repair PayPal subscribers with missing token

Hello @openmindculture

Firstly, I would like to clarify that the linked thread does not have a direct relation to the current state of this issue. It is outdated.

The “ERROR Payment failed. No payment tokens found for customer XX” issue may arise due different reasons.

Payment Method Not Properly Vaulted: This error can occur if the payment method isn’t correctly stored (“vaulted”) on PayPal’s server. When a customer attempts to renew a subscription, the expected payment method might not be available on the server, leading to this error.

This typically happens when the initial payment is made, but the PayPal server fails to store the payment method. Typically, the absence of a payment token is not caused by the plugin.

To resolve this, the customer can try to store their payment method again by making any PayPal payment on the website while logged in and with the Vaulting feature active. Once a PayPal payment is made, the payment method should be stored, enabling automatic renewals for the subscription. Automatic renewals require a payment token on PayPal’s server; without it, automatic renewals are not feasible.

Customers Changing Payment Method: If a customer changes a subscription from something else to PayPal while there is no saved payment method, then this error could indeed happen. To prevent this, implementing a filter that restricts users from changing their payment methods is advisable. You can find this filter at?this link. Please add it using the?Code Snippets?plugin. This should help avoid similar issues in the future.

Please be assured that our team is committed to resolving this. We are working on implementing Vault V3, expected in Q1 of 2024, which should comprehensively address these issues and improve the payment process.

Kind regards,

Krystian

Thanks so far!

Can the problem be caused by customers who do a single purchase with PayPal payment as guests without a shop customer account and who only create their shop customer account when using the same PayPal account to place a subscription order in the same shop later?

The above scenario is currently possible, as customers can buy as guests as long as they do not place subscription orders. This works well for users who use credit cards instead of PayPal.

Does this plugin store a token or a corresponding reference or key in the shop’s database? Where can we verify if the shop part is working correctly?

Some further details from log files and order history:

Typically, the absence of a payment token is not caused by the plugin.

It looks like the customers do have a token on the PayPal server. Verified from both sides: the user can also see the active recurring payment in their PayPal account.

Log excerpt for problematic payments:

https://api-m.paypal.com/v2/checkout/orders
Request Body: {“intent”:”CAPTURE”,
…
{“user_action”:”CONTINUE”,”shipping_preference”:”GET_FROM_FILE”
…
“return_url”:”[…]?wc-ajax=ppc-return-url”
“payment_method”:{“payee_preferred”:”IMMEDIATE_PAYMENT_REQUIRED”}
Response: Array
(
[code] => 201
[message] => Created
)
…
POST https://api-m.paypal.com/v1/identity/generate-token
Response: Array
(
[code] => 200
[message] => OK
)

vs. log excerpt when generating token for new customer:

POST https://api-m.paypal.com/v1/identity/generate-token
Response: Array
(
[code] => 200
[message] => OK
)
…
POST https://api-m.paypal.com/v1/notifications/verify-webhook-signature
Request Body: …
"event_type":"VAULT.PAYMENT-TOKEN.CREATED","summary":"A payment token has been created."

The explicit token created event seems to be missing when existing customers place their orders and allow subscriptions, while it works when new customers place their order in a seemingly identical way.

When recurring payments fail, I can't find any explicit error in any log file, but WooCommerce order history shows:

"Payment failed. No payment tokens found for customer 8. Status der Bestellung von Zahlung ausstehend auf Fehlgeschlagen ge?ndert."

(German text part translates to: order status changed from pending payment to failed.)

So what is the proper way to deal with "typically" and seemingly situation of the existing customers? Can we find additional logs or meta information somewhere else? Any other helpful ideas?

Hello @openmindculture

it’s important to understand that this situation is primarily managed by PayPal. From the plugin’s perspective, there isn’t much that can be done when the failure occurs on PayPal’s side. The main indicator in the logs would be only the message “Payment failed. No payment tokens found for customer,” which doesn’t provide extensive details for further analysis.

However, if you wish to delve deeper into this matter, there are some aspects you can investigate. Payment tokens, which are crucial in this scenario, are stored in the wp_woocommerce_payment_tokens table. Additionally, the Usermeta table contains valuable information such as the ppcp_customer_id and ppcp-vault-token. It’s worth noting that the ppcp-vault-token data is also present in the wp_woocommerce_payment_tokens table.

This issue has been recognized and will be addressed in the upcoming vault v3 update, as previously mentioned in our communications.

Kind Regards,

Krystian

Same over here. (ERROR Payment failed. No payment tokens found for customer XXXXX).

We use Woo Subscriptions in conjunction with Cartflows (paypal reference transactions enabled). For customers who do not yet have an account, an account is created when the order is placed. Like Ingo, I assume that the token cannot be assigned to a customer, as the customer account is only created later (when the attempt is made to assign the token to a customer).

The paypal tokens are also not stored in the “woocommerce_payment_tokens” table. In contrast to Stripe. On the (test) customer’s side, however, the payment agreement with the merchant (us) is stored in the PayPal account. Nevertheless, the corresponding PayPal account will not be debited when a renewal is attempted. Therefore, it really seems to be due to the fact that PayPal Payments cannot assign the “Token” to a customer id.

Is there an exact timing, as the entire payment solution is absolutely useless for us.

What’s the current status and planned updates for PayPal vaulting? If I understand the plugin’s changelog correctly, there has been some critical changes that have been rolled back concerning Vaulting? Fix – Can not refund order purchased with Vault v3 Card payment #1997. Does this mean the current plugin version uses PayPal Vault version 3 or not? Is the problem expected to be solved in the current release, WooCommerce PayPal Payments 2.5.4 ? Is there any additional action necessary or recommended to repair existing customers’ database entries or PayPal data?