[Plugin: WP e-Commerce] Avoid WP- ecommerce plugin

Couldn’t agree more, robertmerkt.

I too had MANY problems with WPeC and went to the support forums for help. It was the same problems, over and over, that were still unresolved. Most of them didn’t have any responses from developers.

I’m not naive enough to think that a developer should hold my hand installing this stuff or install it for me, but this is some of the worst support I’ve ever received. Even some of the free WP plugins I use have better support. After a few weeks of trying to get the plugin to work, I gave up.

I tried contacting Instinct for a refund and was ignored.

I posed in the “premium support” forum asking for a refund and finally got a response. I was told that the terms I agreed to when purchasing the plugin said no refunds. I was also told that any issues were due to a “poorly written theme” and were not because of the plugin. The funny part is, the theme I was using was a theme that was recommended on the WPeC website…

So here I am now, with WPeC that doesn’t work, no support at al, and no refund.

I’ve since bought PHPurchase (https://www.phpurchase.com/) and am very satisfied. It installed and worked perfectly from the get go. I haven’t had to use their support yet, but from what I’ve seen in the support forums, actual employees are responding to people in a timely manner. Best of all, they actually stand behind their product and have a 60-day money back guarantee, no questions asked.

Maybe WP E-commerce is a good plugin and I’m not smart enough or technical enough to get it to work. I really wanted it to work, but I just couldn’t get it. I probably would have been okay with that. Not every plugin works for everyone.

However, the lack of support (and the fact that I am clearly not the only person with support issues) should be a big red flag to anyone considering spending money on this plugin. Buyer beware, if you can’t get it to work on your own, you’re screwed.

I wish, WISH, I had waited a little longer before deciding to try WPeC. Junk. Save your money. I will probably try PHPurchase but man has WPeC turned me off of shopping with wordpress. I tried some other solutions before settling on WPeC and thought, after doing quite a bit of research, that it would be a great plugin and it almost was.

Yes, plugin, not plugin with some tweaks, fixes, hand holding, changes, alterations, update errors, payment errors, download errors, theme errors, extra consultants, paid documents, forums for everyone who isn’t the developer…

You get the point. This is a product that is paid for and in my part of the world (maybe yours too), when something you paid for fails, you get your money back. This has failed, they offer little support (if any) and they keep the money. I’m happy there are people here who happen to be developers willing to modify it to work and people who acknowledge that some tuning is in order, but once it’s not free, it should work. <– Period. If it were free, fine, tune as needed but this is a product that is purchased and it is sub-par at best. The fact they say no refunds up front should be enough to turn all potential clients off.

If there were a BBB for online companies, they would be an F Rating.

still junk?

i know it was FILLED with bugs in the past, but i’ve had been playing around with that plugin since late 2008 and it had come far along over the years. i remember a pretty good experience the last time i tinkered with it more than a year ago. sucks to hear there are still major gripes with it *SIGH*

Guyz, Calm down.

Visit my demo site to see how AWSOME the WP e-Commerce Plugin:
https://ihayag.com/wpplugin/store-sample/store-1/ is.

Love to hear from you and I will be happy to help you.

[This post, titled “Defection,” was deleted from the WP-ecommerce forums; I don’t blame them ;)]

I just wanted to say that after spending over $300 on WP-ecommerce and related plugins I’ve finally defected. I settled on Cart66 (formerly PHPurchase) after several years of searching and I couldn’t be happier:

It is incomparably nimbler than wp-ecommerce (or any other plugin I’ve tried) and offers way more customization. It is nimble because the “products” are don’t require entire template structure—just the bare essentials of the product are entered. Those essentials include product variations (which are incredibly simple) and even custom fields that allow user-entered information (such as engraving names, or gift addresses). Since the products aren’t themselves “posts,” you simply embed them into your own custom post type (or wherever else you want them). Here’s an excellent tutorial on how it works [Part 1] [Part 2] :

Admittedly, there aren’t as many bells and whistles as wp-ecommerce but the developers are adding new feature at a rapid pace. Critically, whenever they do roll out a new feature, it works!
Still, two major advantages Cart66 has over WP-ecommerce are member subscriptions and Gravity Forms integration. You can integrate as many member levels as you like and it is a snap to show and hide content based on the users login status. Cart66 has now integrated Paypal subscriptions that automatically renew, if you so choose. I admit that the Gravity Forms plugin is expensive but it is much more than a form plugin. The fact that you can integrate these slick forms into your checkout and product selection process is invaluable. Also, you get free MailChimp, Campaign Monitor, etc. (managing user lists) plugins free with your Gravity forms purchase.
Cart66 is a very slick plugin at a very reasonable cost. The bottom line is: for what it attempts to do, it does it perfectly. I urge you to try it out.
P.S. I do not hate WP-ecommerce—I think the developer is a good person and the plugin isn’t horrible. I’m simply highly annoyed by the fact that, on the whole, it works very poorly but thousands of users have bought it. It is a classic case of an undue reputation garnered entirely as a result of a fortuitous name.

Thank you, Jamil, for the encouragement. Just wanted to let everyone know that Cart66 Lite is now available in the official WordPress repository. It’s a great way to see how Cart66 works for free.

Quick update: We have published a free PDF of documentation for Cart66 Lite to help get you up and running quickly.

Thanks for publishing the documentation. I actually downloaded cart66 lite and managed to get it up, running, tested and live with no documentation on our custom theme site within a day of download. Whereas with wp e-commerce it was error after error after error after error… Still populating products and setting up shipping on physical products but we’ll be purchasing the 5 site license soon.

Just happy that it worked, error free, as advertised.

Thank you!