Interface to SET (Secure Electronic Transaction) protocol
In addition to SSL protocol that was supported in previous releases, the 4.6A release includes an interface to the new, more secure SET protocol.
SET protocol guarantees the safety of payment card purchases made over open networks such as the Internet. The comprehensive SET specification is based on advanced encryption technology, including digital certificates that electronically confirm the identity of each party involved in an electronic transaction (the customer, the retailer, and the clearing institution). The retailer does not see the customer's credit card information, but instead receives verification from the clearing institution. Customers are assured that their credit care information remains secure, and the retailer is guaranteed to receive payment from the clearing house.
Because the customers can be identified, they must be certified by a certification authority. This is usually done with "electronic wallet" software, which is a browser plug-in available from a bank or clearing institution, for example.The customer is required by the SET standard to have an electronic wallet in order to pay for merchandise, so if you want to use SET, then you must expect your customers to have electronic wallets.
If customers do not have electronic wallets, they can still pay with credit cards via the SSL protocol instead of SET.
Enhanced support for customer addresses
You can have a ship-to address that differs from the sold-to address. This is useful when customers want to have their merchandise delivered to the office rather than to their homes, or are purchasing gifts for others. In the case of gifts, this allows you to capture a second address for your mailing list.
In addition to individual customers, you can also handle business partner addresses via the online store. Instead of requiring a personal name, the form requires the customer to enter up to four lines for the company address. As a minimum, an entry must be made on the first line.
One-time customers (CPD) now permitted, with simplified data entry
For new customers, there are now two scenarios:
Expanded (showing all shops and all articles in the hierarchy). The customer has no control over the display.
In sales order processing, the CPD functionality in SD is used for one-time customers.
New controls for displaying the product browser hierarchy
You can control how the product browser hierarchy (shops and articles) appears:
Enhanced support for multimedia objects
Normally an article can have up to three documents assigned to it: a large image, a small image, and a sound file. You can change the Customizing settings to display additional documents (for example, .avi or .wav files). You assign these documents in product catalog maintenance and they will appear as hyperlinks in the online store at the product detail level. Depending on whether the customer's browser or viewer application supports a particular document format, clicking on a hyperlink will cause the document to be displayed or be downloaded to his or her PC.
Multimedia objects are not normally shown in lists, but you can change the Customizing settings and alter the HTML template so that they do appear in lists (e.g., store table of contents or product lists) as well as for individual shops and products.
Ability to display the purchase price and the price in Euros
In addition to the actual consumer sales price, you can also display the purchase price, and the sales price in Euros.
Customers now able to change the desired delivery date
The system proposes a delivery date, but the customer can override this and type in a different delivery date, if desired. The system will then check availability and verify whether the desired date can be met or not.
Additional user exits
The following user exits are included in this release: