Issue with product category search

Hi all,

I’m using the Shop Elite Theme, which by default comes with a product search and a product category search. The product search is a text field into which you type your search keywords and the product search is a drop-down in which you select the category from the list.

I felt the product category search was redundant, so I hid it from the site using CSS. Unfortunately, despite being hidden, it is still causing me problems.

If you use the product search on the homepage, shop homepage, standard page or product page it works as expected and returns relevant results. This is because no specific category is selected. When you visit a category page, the category drop-down is pre-populated with the category you’re in. However, if you use the product search on any category page, including categories in which the product(s) actually appear, no results are returned. This is one of the main reasons I hid it in the first place, but it’s now at the point where it’s potentially costing me money, as I can see people searching for keywords on my site while on category pages (that should be returning results), and instead nothing is being returned.

If you use “tall ships” as an example search on the homepage, any product page and any category page you’ll see exactly what I mean. I’m wondering how I go about resolving this, and if anyone else has encountered this issue?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The page I need help with: [log in to see the link]