Credit Card Payments

Here’s some good news for the New Year – I’ve finally finished implementing credit card payments for OD Plus subscriptions. This means that the days of having to use PayPal to pay for our subscriptions are over (thank goodness).

Don’t get me wrong – I don’t have anything personally against PayPal, and I think they stand to become one of the most important forces on the Net, but our diarists have consistently had problems with them reliably processing their payments.

I spent a couple months testing different credit card processing solutions, and finally decided on LinkPoint. LinkPoint is one of the largest and best-known online card companies, and provides credit card processing for thousands of online merchants. LinkPoint provides us with a highly secure and reliable platform to accept credit card payments.

Although it was somewhat complicated on my end, for all of you it is pretty simple – on the Subscription Payment screen, you will now see a pair of “Secure Payment” buttons where the PayPal buttons used to be. Clicking them will take you to a secure screen on the LinkPoint servers where you can enter your credit card information (yes, just one screen instead of the four that PayPal required). Once your payment has been processed, your subscription will be credited and you will be returned to Open Diary with a brand-spanking-new OD Plus subscription.

I know there are some of you who had problems with PayPal payments in December – their servers did not update ours with some of the transactions that were made. I am working through these, and you will receive credit if you made a PayPal payment that didn’t work.

I know that this new platform will provide us with a much easier and better way to pay for subscriptions, so these sorts of problems should be a thing of the past.

I also had stated previously that I was going to make a method available for gift subscriptions – that will be coming soon. I just wanted to wait until I had this payment module finished and online before I did the gift thing.

EDIT: adding this after a few notes – this new payment procedure does NOT require you to sign up for an account like PayPal did. It is simply a credit card transaction, like buying Better Cooking Through the Magic of Ramen from Amazon, or purchasing a cat leash from PetSmart.

The DiaryMaster

Swweeettt!!!! Thanks!

Whew! Thank you! I’m going to renew right now. 🙂

Well, I got this message: Form Processing Error The following errors occurred while processing your request: It is not possible to order from the store at this time. Contact the merchant for further information (error 1002).

hi. i have a couple questions… who are you? i know your the creator of this, but who are you?? i bet you have a real diary on here huh? i’m just really, really curious to who you are! please respond..

wonderful!

This is awesome. I still can’t believe those idiots at PayPal made so many millions on that IPO. Bleh.

You probably already know this but MAGS is locked out of her diary. She evidently has not been credited for a money order mailed in mid December. Can you help her please? She has reported the problem but doesn’t seem to be getting help. Thanks for checking it out.

but paypal protected my anonymity. To whom do the payments show now? paypal was EASY for people who use it regularly. I would like to keep it as an option. for many of us it is a matter of one click. The money comes from my checking account directly. I don’t write checks, and i don’t wish to leave a paper trail either. Can’t we have the choice?

i don’t understand the big deal on gift subscriptions either… all that was ever needed was to hand over the password of a new diary to the giftee after payment. I’ve done this several times. I appreciate your work toward solving problems on this site, just don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

That is good – I may be able to continue my subscription now. I don’t use Paypal, so perhaps this instead might work.. If it doesn’t, I’ll let you know.

Nope, after checking, it’s still no good. With amazon payment I could pay by Switch card, Link doesn’t have that option. Can you think of anything that the rest of us can use?

Well, its too bad about paypal.. I really liked the ease of it and have no credit card, I used my bank account. So unfortunately this means the end of my OD in Febuary. Its been a great time for me, and I will be sorry to see it go. Thanks for everything you have done on this site. it made the past few years more interesting.

Are you ever going to make it so that everyone on here has to pay…because that would be a real bummer…like I understand that to be able to get a more inclusive diary you pay but well for just the basoc I liek not halfting to pay….well thanx…and could u please respond to my other note I left you like a day or two ago…thanx

Me first! Fix me first! Thank you. 😉

do they also offer direct debit from checking accounts?

Hello diarymaster, I tried to post some pictures on my journal but it seems that they only show up for me, not for everyone else. Is there a way to fix this? Thank you!

Quick question. I have three free diaries: one exclusively for my poetry, one for my regular diary-days and one for this pregnancy forum. If I were to switch to OD plus, would I only be able to do that for ONE diary, or would all three of them be covered under one plan?

Ahhh… never mind, I now see what chapters would be good for 🙂

Yeah, I’m definitely getting that book for my twentysomething son.

seriously! can u PLEASE help me!…