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Netscape Merchant System™ Frequently Asked Questions
1. What makes Netscape Merchant System different from Netscape Enterprise Server? 2. What is a typical Netscape Merchant System configuration? 3. How customizable is Netscape Merchant System? 4. What tools does Netscape Merchant System provide for customizing product display templates? 5. Is there a hosting fee applicable to the number of merchants who are using Netscape Merchant System? 6. Do I have to manually generate the merchandise display pages for all of my products? 7. What are the advantages of buying a Netscape Merchant System Staging Server? 8. How do I move my "staged" merchant content from the Staging Server to the Merchant System production environment? 9. Can shoppers shop, browse, return items, and shop again without losing track of their purchases? 10. Does the Netscape Merchant System include product search capabilities? Can merchants define queries to entice consumers to 11. How do merchants load data into Netscape Merchant System? 12. Can merchants undertake promotional activities using Netscape Merchant System to spur greater sales? 13. Does Merchant System support multiple shipping models? Are there any limits on the number of shipping couriers and shipping options per courier that a merchant can have? 14. How can I ensure that sales taxes are calculated correctly for all purchased items? Can I generate regular reports detailing sales tax activity for auditing purposes? 15. How are completed purchase orders delivered to the merchants for fulfillment processing? 16. Does Netscape Merchant System include credit card processing capability? 17. Does Netscape Merchant System support online processing of credit card transactions? 18. How secure are my customers' credit card transactions? 19. Does Netscape Merchant System support non-Netscape browsers? 20. Do you need to have SQL*Net connectivity software if Netscape Merchant System is installed on multiple machines? 21. How does Netscape Merchant System handle credits and refunds? 22. Can merchants on Netscape Merchant System dramatically lower the payment processing fees that they pay to their credit card acquirer? 23. Can Netscape Merchant System be easily internationalized for use outside of the United States?
What makes Netscape Merchant System different from Netscape Enterprise Server? While Netscape Merchant System and Netscape Enterprise Server have some of the same functionality such as an integrated search engine, Merchant System provides much more, including advanced page generation and loading programs, discounts and coupons support, handling of multiple product and stock keeping unit (SKU) attributes, transaction and credit card processing, shipping and sales tax calculations, and secure order fulfillment delivery, which the Netscape Enterprise Server does not currently include. These enabling features allow our customers to quickly deploy an industrial-strength, commercial Web site for online merchandising. Netscape Merchant System includes the Enterprise Server as an integrated component for managing the application's HTTP and secure HTTP connections and providing high scalability and reliability for rapidly expanding, 24 x 7 Netscape Merchant System sites.
What is a typical Netscape Merchant System configuration? A common Netscape Merchant System configuration is to deploy Merchant Server on a powerful high-end workstation for handling high volumes of hits from browsing consumers and a smaller workstation behind the firewall to handle the transactions and order delivery for completed purchases. This is because the ratio of browsing-to-purchasing is much greater than one-to-one. The number of merchants and consumers that Netscape Merchant System can support simultaneously will depend upon the type of system(s) on which the software is installed.
How customizable is Netscape Merchant System? To enable customers to deploy their commercial sites rapidly, Netscape Merchant System includes a number of predefined HTML forms and extensions that you can enter immediately for setting up storefronts and defining pricing policies and search conditions, contact names for merchants, shipping rules, sales tax conditions, and credit card processing capabilities. The majority of these forms are HTML template files that you can easily configure to suit the business and end-customer requirements of your site. In addition, we provide HTML display page extensions and APIs for tailoring Netscape Merchant System's storefront and product displays to meet merchants' unique merchandising and transaction processing requirements. Almost every functional area of the Netscape Merchant System is customizable. What tools does Netscape Merchant System provide for customizing product display templates? Merchants can use robust HTML extensions, known as meta language extensions (MLEs), that Netscape Mechant System provides to< easily bind their product page templates directly to underlying database values. This ensures that merchant information displayed in the pages is always current and consistent. Merchants can create their own links within their templates using MLE. For example, the Merchant System uses MLE to automatically detect price changes, then automatically regenerates the affected pages to display the new prices. Merchants can also use MLE to embed conditional logic into their templates to make their product displays and information more dynamic and responsive to their selling environment. An example of this would be to have a special offer A on product B until date C, and then to have an everyday low price of D on product B after date C.
Is there a hosting fee applicable to the number of merchants who are using Netscape Merchant System? No. Netscape Merchant System's pricing is based on the platform model the merchant chooses for each of the Merchant System servers.
Do I have to manually generate the merchandise display pages for all of my products? No. The Netscape Merchant System includes an automatic product page generation program that detects any product information updates you have entered, and updates the product pages immediately to display the most current information (e.g., prices, new SKUs, etc.). What are the advantages of buying a Netscape Merchant Staging Server? Netscape Merchant Staging Server is useful for merchants who want to screen their product displays in a preproduction environment before going live. Staging Server shares Merchant Server's robust product data management and automatic display generation capabilities. Therefore, merchants can initiate price changes, product changes, and storefront changes that they can test before pushing content online for customer viewing. This is particularly useful when Netscape Merchant System is used in a multimerchant context where merchants concurrently set up and update their storefronts and product displays. How do I move my staged merchant content from the Staging Server to the Merchant Server production environment? The Netscape Merchant System provides an automated extraction program for moving content from Staging Server to Merchant Server. Merchants enter their approval through an HTML form interface and send this to the Netscape Merchant System site operator. Upon receipt, the operator or an automated process can invoke the extraction program that re-creates the structured product information file with all of the merchant's display templates, graphics, audio, and essential product information (such as attributes and prices), and sends it via secure mail to Merchant Server. Merchant Server automatically detects the incoming file, loads the product information into the database and the template and other files into the appropriate directory structure, and generates the storefront and product pages for immediate consumer review and purchase selection. Can shoppers shop, browse, return items, and shop again without losing track of their purchases? Yes. The electronic shopping cart feature in Netscape Merchant System allows shoppers to browse through any store(s), place items into the cart, take items out of the cart, leave the mall at anytime, and return to continue shopping. You can configure a time interval after which the shopping cart will be emptied. Does Netscape Merchant System include product search capabilities? Can merchants define queries to entice consumers to purchase related products? Netscape Merchant System includes a full version of the powerful Verity search engine. This provides a robust yet flexible search interface that merchants can configure to streamline the shopping process for their customers. When search criteria are entered, Netscape Merchant System generates a hyperlink list of all product pages that meet the shopper's criteria. The consumer can then go directly to the page of the product that matches their needs and interests. The search engine also supports merchant-defined related searches so that related items can be linked for effective cross-selling of more merchandise. Merchants can easily create these queries and include them with the product information files they load into Netscape Merchant System for display. How do merchants load data into Netscape Merchant System? Netscape Merchant System provides a batch loading program that uses a structured file format to automatically upload new product information for several products concurrently within a single batch into either the Staging or Merchant Server. Merchants can easily create these files with any text editor and deliver them remotely to Netscape Merchant System site via FTP or email for automated loading and display review. This enables merchants to set up new storefronts easily, and update product inventory information quickly in response to rapidly changing market conditions. Can merchants undertake promotional activities using the Netscape Merchant System to spur greater sales? Netscape Merchant System supports product discounts and coupons, which shoppers can easily select during their excursions. Both "$ off" and "% off" coupons are supported. Merchants can easily assign valid coupons to products with the product files they create and deliver to Netscape Merchant System. When a customer selects a coupon, the electronic shopping basket holds it for the entire shopping process and ensures that it is deducted from the order-subtotal amount when the customer initiates the checkout process. Does Merchant System support multiple shipping models? Are there any limits on the number of shipping couriers and shipping options per courier that a merchant can have? Netscape Merchant System supports per-product, order-subtotal, and weight-range-based shipping models for merchants. Each of these merchants can have an unlimited number of shipping couriers (such as Federal Express and UPS) and shipping options for these shipping couriers (first day, second day, etc.). How can I ensure that sales taxes are calculated correctly for all purchased items? Can I generate regular reports detailing sales tax activity for auditing purposes? Netscape Merchant System includes a fully integrated TaxWare Sales/Use Tax System for calculating the appropriate sales tax for each purchased item when a shopper checks out. This sales tax engine uses the type of product purchased, the merchant business's point of origin (merchant nexus), and the shipping address of the consumer to generate the appropriate sales tax. TaxWare provides monthly updates to Netscape Merchant System merchants to ensure that they provide accurate tax sums for every purchase.
The TaxWare system can also generate and automatically deliver sales tax audit reports to merchants via secure email. Netscape Merchant System provides an intuitive HTML administrative form for merchants to specify how often (biweekly, monthly) they wish to receive these reports (if they subscribe) as well as all the merchant's nexus locations.
How are completed purchase orders delivered to the merchants for fulfillment processing? Netscape Merchant System includes an integrated, privacy-enhanced messaging program that delivers orders directly to merchants immediately after successful completion of the online purchase checkout process. This message system uses digital envelopes, signatures, and certificates based on Public Key Cryptography Standards (PKCS) to authenticate the sender and encrypt sensitive purchase-order contents. The system conforms with the Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension standards (S/MIME). Netscape Merchant System Transaction Server also receives and stores acknowledgements of successful order deliveries to individual merchants as an audit trail. If an order is not successfully delivered within a configurable period, the messaging program automatically resends the order.
Does Netscape Merchant System include credit card processing capability? Yes. Secure, online credit card transactions are enabled in the Netscape Merchant System through its Transaction Server. Does Netscape Merchant System support online processing of credit card transactions? Yes. Netscape Merchant System provides real-time credit card authorization processing through either secure encryption over the open Internet or leased lines using X.25 message formatting. Both allow you to do real-time processing through First Data Corporation's authorization center.
How secure are my customers' credit card transactions? All transactions are bidirectionally encrypted so that the credit card number cannot be captured during either the transport of authorization requests to credit card acquirers or the acquirers' responses. Does Netscape Merchant System support non-Netscape browsers? Yes. Netscape Merchant System supports all SSL-compliant browsers that adhere to Cookie specifications for sending information between clients and servers as part of HTTP responses. Do you need to have SQL*Net connectivity software if Netscape Merchant System is installed on multiple machines? No. You do not need Oracle connectivity software to use Netscape Merchant System, even if you install it on multiple machines. Therefore, you could have the Staging Server, Merchant Server, and Transaction Servers all on different machines and still not need SQL*NET for connectivity. Such connectivity software is only necessary if the databases do not reside on the Merchant or Staging Server machines. How does Netscape Merchant System handle credits and refunds? Merchant System provides utilities that allow both full and partial refunds of previous purchases. It also maintains a detailed audit trail in its Transaction Server for these credits and refunds of both the updated orders and payment amounts, including the associated (and prorated) shipping and sales tax charges. Can merchants on Netscape Merchant System dramatically lower the payment processing fees they pay to their credit card acquirer? Yes. Netscape Merchant System supports an address validation system (AVS) that allows merchants to ensure that the customer's entered addresses are sent to First Data Corporation (FDC) in addition to the requisite credit card information during the checkout process. This provides FDC with an additional information to validate that the customer sending each payment authorization request is the party whom he or she claims to be. In return for this assurance, FDC provides the merchants with significantly lower transaction fees. Can Netscape Merchant System be easily internationalized for use outside of the United States? Yes. Netscape Merchant System can be easily customized to support a variety of date and currency formats, as well as to capture different customer profile information (as part of the merchandising process). In addition, the application includes international files that can be used to execute product searches in different languages, and it can tailor several error messages to the appropriate local context.
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