I found when trying to create vouchers for customers was that no matter how I did it, nothing was making it work. I read the help section, I read the directions on the voucher page and some of the posts in the forums. Still I wasn't getting anywhere with it.

One night just fooling around with it, I was determined to get it right. According to the posts in the forum, I had everything right but then I noticed that in the text box where you put in the code I actually had the numbers in it not the letters. This proved to make a big difference in the results.

Lets start off with the code for the voucher.

C is the number of the code, you only have a range of 1 through 5.

Many use the voucher mask CMMYYNNNN
If you don't use vouchers leave the Voucher mask box blank.

The five different codes corresponds with the five different voucher types that you can set up in Admin.

Free shipping does not need an amount, anything entered in any of the boxes for that code will be ignored...

MMYY is for the expiration date, for example: 1203 is December 2003.

NNNN is the issue number. This will be a number that you give the voucher that is between the Issue Min and Issue Max. You can vary this. Instead of 4 (NNNN) you can use 3(NNN) this has to be reflected in the Issue Min and Max.

In the section for the Min and Max, the numbers you put there should correspond to the number of Ns you have in your voucher code. The numbers should be a broad range, kind of like 0 to 9. IF you have 4 Ns in your code 112022345 Your 4 Ns would be 2345 so your Issue Minimum would be 2000. The amount you would list for Issue Maximum would be 2999.

Say you made a voucher to give customers $5.00 off their purchase, and the code you have is CMMYYNNN. The numbers you have for C (the code number for the voucher, 1 through 5. If you only made this one it would be 1). The MMYY, like mentioned before, is the expiration date. Say you want it to expire Oct 2003, it would be 1003. And the last letters you have left are the 3 Ns. In your Issue Min you would start with say 100 and in your Issue Max you would have 199. To keep track of what customer is using the vouchers, you can change the Ns anywhere between 100 and 199. So if you gave Sally A. the first one it would be 11003100 and you gave John R. the last one his would be 11003199..

You can issue the vouchers either as an image like coupon you see on some sites, or you can purchase gift certificate forms at your local office supply store and put in the name, voucher number, expiration date and any other pertinent information.

You can also email the number to the customer as an incentive to purchase some of your products. A good example is Amazon.com. Occasionally, they email customers with an offer for a discount on their next purchase. You can send it in an email stating that you are offering them a voucher on their next purchase and give instructions on where they enter their code as well as when the offer expires.

If you purchase gift certificates at an office supply store or create your own, you can either send it along with their present order as an incentive or a surprise gift, or you can offer them on your web site as a gift certificate in any cash amount you want to sell ($10, $20, $50, $100) and you simply snail mail them the voucher (along with instructions on how to redeem) for that dollar amount.

Example:

For NNNN you pick 2543 Issue Min: 2000 Issue Max: 2999

Does this mean that you will only issue 999 vouchers? Yes..

For NNN you pick 274 Issue Min: 200 Issue Max: 299

Ditto, 99 vouchers? Yes
NOTE: the numbers 2543 and 274 represent the voucher numbers being issued to customers.
Each voucher number can be any number between the min and max issue numbers

If you decide that you want to give your customers a fixed amount of $10 off and you want it to expire in August of 2002 and this is the first voucher, this is what it should look like.

Voucher Mask: CMMYYNNN (3 Ns)
Code: 1
Type: a fixed value of
Amount or %: 10 (no monetary symbols or percentages)
Issue Min: 300
Issue Max: 399

Your voucher for this fixed amount of $10 should be anywhere between 10802300 to 10802399. For example: the gift voucher number 10802365 will give a the $10 discount applied to the total before shipping and taxes.

If you check the "percentage of" button instead of the "fixed value" button, with the same values shown above, this would give your customers 10 percent off of the total before tax and shipping are added and the final total is given. To recap, the discount is given before the shipping and tax and before the total

Lets do it again for percentage.
To create this, we'll use the NNNN (4 Ns) and the same expiration date as above but we'll give 20% off. This will be your second voucher.

Voucher Mask: CMMYYNNNN
Code: 2
Type: a percentage of
Amount or %: 20 (no monetary symbols or percentages)
Issue Min: 2000
Issue Max: 2999

Your voucher should be between 2000 to 2999. For example: 208022145.

Kim Arauz http://www.lilliedillies.com/ lilliedillies@hotmail.com

ADDENDUM (This means stolen from Mals help page with some revisions and additions)

When you offer vouchers they are numbered between the min and max issue which means that normally you would issue one voucher with a unique number to a customer to buy for use as a gift certificate or send to a special customer via email. In some cases you may want a voucher to be used multiple times. In this case the voucher code can be used as a discount code for $$ off or for free shipping for certain special customers or groups.

The cart does not keep a record of which vouchers have already been used. So you need to check them carefully when you receive an order. However, by using the expiration date sensibly and by altering the range from time to time, you should be able keep the number of valid voucher codes quite small and easy to manage.

The cart only accepts one voucher per order.

The value of discount vouchers is added onto any other discount you may have set-up in the discounts section in cart set up. Fixed value vouchers appear in the totals under the line Voucher. Free shipping vouchers simply reduce the shipping amount to zero regardless of how you have shipping set up for your cart.

If you choose to use vouchers then a text box appears automatically in your cart where they can enter their number. It doesn't specify what the voucher is for, it's assumed that customer already knows. This is important, it's so that your customers who don't have discount vouchers don't feel they are paying more than they need to. Instead, most will assume the box is for gift vouchers only.