This is an update to the article in our newsletter that was sent out a few weeks ago.

There was some confusion, so we went back to our merchant bank and asked for further clarification.

The regulations require online stores to perform a 2 stage credit card transaction, first an Authorization then a Delayed Capture (which charges the credit card). The Delayed Capture is performed when you "Ship" an order in your QBaroo store.

Authorization Expiration - The authorization will be downgraded by the bank (thus higher % fees) if the card is not charged (shipped) within 24 hours. Furthermore, the authorization can expire anywhere from 7 days to 30 days. The issuing bank reserves the right to reject teh transaction after 7 days. This will result in an expired Authorization and an Error 3 in QBaroo. This can also result in a $25 chargeback fee to you on each order, if you are using your own online merchant account. If you are a percentage customer, you will not see any rise in fees, as QBaroo absorbs those fees for you.

Charges over Authorized Amount - Since December 2007, we have seen a rise in errors on orders that are being charged an amount greater than the Authorized amount. If the charge goes through, the transaction will be downgraded and you will be charged a higher % on the transaction if you are using your own online merchant account. If you are a percentage customer, you will not see any rise in fees, as QBaroo absorbs those fees for you.

We hope this clarifies the VISA regulations a bit better. As always, feel free to contact us with any questions. We have a 4 Mb PDF file that spells this all out that we would be happy to send to you.

We have decided to start our corporate Blog as another method of communicating with our customers and prospects. Email addresses change frequently, and many of us get so much email on a regular basis that spam filters often prevent some communications from reaching our customers.

Here we will post support tips & tricks, new features, features stores, and marketing ideas to help you get the most out of your QBaroo store or website. We want every site to be successful, so please visit often and read our helpful articles and tips.

For our scrapbook retailers, we will post updates to the image library when new releases become available.

Since we are adding features to our store regularly, it makes keeping an up to date manual a full time job, so we will instead post FAQ pages for the "How do I..." types of questions we frequently get.

We are sure you will find the blog info useful and informative, and sometimes a little fun!

The QBaroo Crew

We provide one of the most convenient ways to charge for shipping. We have domestic and international shipping tables, with a sliding scale of shipping rates based on the amount of the order. See an example on our demo store:

http://www.qbaroo.com/demostore/shipping.cfm

You can set the amounts in the shipping table to any rate you wish. Note that this table does not list any specific carrier, since each store in each country has their own preferred carrier.

If you like, we can add a more advanced shipping table if you offer ground, 2 day and overnight shipping options. An example of a store using this is Anna Griffin:

http://www.qbaroo.com/annagriffin/shipping.cfm

The first thing you need to do is reserve a domain name, which is your www website address. QBaroo can provide website hosting for you, but you have to reserve the name first with a Registrar service.

Some popular registrar's are:

http://www.godaddy.com
http://www.networksolutions.com

Each offers multi-year discounts if you reserve the name for more than one year. Keep your registration information in a safe place! You will need it when it comes time to renew your domain. If you let your domain expire, your domain could get "hijacked" by another company and they may demand several thousand dollars (US) to sell it back to you. This has happened to several of our customers in the past.

We get asked frequently about sales tax for online orders. You must charge sales tax for the states in which you have physical locations, if orders are shipped to that state.

For example, if you are physically in Utah and a customer in California places an order in your online store which is to be shipped to a Utah address, then the order is charged Utah sales tax. If the same customer places a subsequent order and has it shipped to their home address in California, then no sales tax is charged.

For our USA customers, QBaroo subscribes to an online tax service which provides the current tax rate for all US states. You simply designate the state(s) where your stores are located, and the tax will be calculated automatically.

You must do your own sales tax reporting, just as you would in your brick and mortar store.

If you outside of the USA, please advise us of the tax rates in your area and we will configure your store to charge the correct rates.