Introduction

Checkout is one of the most crucial processes happening in your Online Store. As a store owner, you understand that your online sales depend on whether customers are able to complete it successfully. Therefore, it is your responsibility to ensure it will go smoothly. You should keep your Checkout page tidy and make it as much convenient as possible for your customers to enter the required payment and shipping details quickly.

In this tutorial, our primary focus will be on configuring the Shopping Cart and Checkout-related settings in your X-Cart store.

Accessing the Cart and Checkout page

To begin, please log in to your X-Cart Admin Area and navigate through the left-hand side menu bar to Store setup > Cart & checkout.

The "Cart & checkout" page consists of three separate tabs. In this tutorial, we will cover the first "General" tab.

Configuring Storefront and Checkout Settings

The "General" tab is open by default when you land on the "Cart & checkout" page. It holds all checkout-related settings which you need to configure to meet the specific needs of your business.

For a start, you need to select the desired "Checkout type". By default, X-Cart supports two checkout types: "Fast Lane Checkout" and "One page checkout".

• Fast Lane Checkout - This type divides the checkout process into a few steps, i.e., separated pages. In these steps, your customers have to submit the required personal data, select the preferred shipping method, and choose the desired payment method. Customers are obligated to complete the current step to be able to proceed to the next one. Note that for registered and logged customers, the personal information, shipping, and payment method preferences are acquired by their account profile. Therefore, they will only need to verify their details and apply any changes if required. This method is considered more consistent and straightforward, as the required information is entered in small portions, and the possibility of getting errors during data submission is lowered.

Step One: Addresses

Step Two: Shipping

Step Three: Payment

• One page checkout - This type displays all the required information to be entered on one page, divided into a few blocks. The method is considered quite faster compared to the previous one. However, it can lead to errors during data submission.

When you select the desired checkout type, you can jump right to the following "Customer Zone Settings" section.

These settings allow you to control and customize the product appearance on the storefront.

• How to show out of stock products - This setting controls whether out-of-stock products are available on the storefront.
• Display check number for eCheck payment method - This setting is intended for stores that support Check payments. If such are enabled on your store, it allows you to control whether customers will be provided with a "Check Number" field while processing check payments.

• Subcategory listings format - Your selection here determines how subcategories are going to be listed on your storefront. There are two available options - "Icons" and "List".

The "Icons" option displays a small image above the subcategory title.

The "List" category, on the other hand, displays only the subcategory title.

• Default order to sort products within a category - Your selection here determines the default, pre-selected sort order of products within a category. The default "Recommended" option acquires the sort order defined by the store admin within the particular category settings.
• Default order to sort products within a search result - In case you are using the default X-Cart product search feature, the description of the previous setting applies in here as well, with the difference that it is intended for search results. If you are using the CloudSearch Addon for your store, there is no need to edit this setting as the addon automatically sets the default sort order for search results based on Relevance.
• Default display mode for products list - Using this setting, you can control the default display mode for product lists. The option selected here will be pre-selected on the storefront when the products are listed. Of course, your customers will be able to change it and select the most convenient one, depending on their preferences. You can choose between a "Grid", "List" and "Table" mode.

Grid view:

List view:

Table view:

• Products per category listing page - Your selection here determines the number of products listed by default when a category page is accessed. Your customers will be provided with a dropdown menu, and they will be able to select another value based on their preferences.

Let's continue with the following settings on this page.

• Maximum products per category listing page - This setting allows you to control the maximum number of products your customers will be able to list on a single category page. 
• Minimum allowed order subtotal - This setting allows you to define a minimum order amount required for customers to be able to checkout. If a minimum order amount is not expected, please leave the value set to "0".
• Maximum allowed order subtotal - With this setting, you can define a maximum subtotal amount above which customers will NOT be allowed to proceed to checkout.
• Maximum order quantity (per product) - This setting lets you set a limit for the maximum number of items customers will be able to purchase from a given product type.
• Force customer to choose product options before adding a product to cart - Your selection here determines whether your customers are obligated to select one of the available product options to be able to place their order. We will recommend you to select the "Yes" option for any product with multiple variations to avoid receiving orders missing essential information.
• Redirect customer to the cart page after a product is added to cart - This setting controls whether customers are automatically redirected to their shopping cart upon adding a product. It is disabled by default, meaning your customers will be able to add products to their crat while shopping simultaneously.
• Display "Add to cart" buttons for products in grid view - This setting controls whether "Add to cart" button is displayed for products when hovered over in the grid view.

When you are ready, please scroll down to the last settings available under this tab.

• Ask anonymous users to create an account or sign in before checkout - This setting lets you control whether visitors will be obligated to sign in to their accounts or create a new account to be able to proceed to checkout.
• Terms and conditions relative URL - The value you enter here represents your store's "Terms and conditions" page relative URL. The "Simple CMS" module enables this page by default. If the module itself is disabled, "Terms and conditions" notice is going to be displayed as a popup at checkout.
• Next order # - This value determines the starting number based on which all future order numbers will be generated. If you leave the value set to "6", your first order will be given an Order number: #6 and each following order, #7, #8, #9, etcetera.
• Cart TTL (days) - In X-Cart, whenever a new visitor accesses your website, a "cart" is created and stored in the database. For unregistered users, this "cart" has a specific lifetime. Since some users might not come back to your website, there is no need to keep this "cart" permanently. In this field, you can define the TTL (Time to Live) of these "carts" in days. Note that this will not apply to register users, their "carts" will be kept along with the user account.
• Enable internal cron service - This setting allows you to control the use of internal corn jobs. Cron jobs are scripts that run periodically and perform specific automated actions, such as removing the expired shopping carts. The use of internal corn jobs improves the performance of your website. Therefore it is recommended to keep it enabled unless an issue is detected.
• Allow customers to sign up for membership - If this setting is enabled, a membership signup box is going to be added on the customer profile details page. They will be allowed to sign up for specific membership groups available in your store. Upon signup, a request will be submitted to your admin email address, and you are going to be able to approve or reject it.
• Users per page - This setting lets you control the number of allowed users per page.
• Number of days to store the last login data -  This setting determines the lifetime of the "recent_login" cookie, which is stored in your customers' browsers. The purpose of this cookie is to allow visitors to log in without the need to enter their login credentials.

When you perform the desired changes, please do not forget to click on the "Submit" button to apply them successfully.

Well done! You have completed the configuration of the checkout type utilized in your store, along with the storefront display settings. We hope the information provided in this tutorial had come in handy to you and helped you to clear out everything there is to know on this matter. In case you have any additional questions on the topic, please do not hesitate to contact our Support Team.