25 Nov 08 eCommerce Problems Resolved
Since the the beginning of October, we’ve had sporadic reports of problems with the membership renewal form on the ALA website. Sometimes it was slow-loading pages, other times there were broken links or the authentication didn’t work.
Until last week, we were unable to replicate the problems, which made troubleshooting them difficult. We knew it wasn’t something across the board, because online transactions are actually up from last year for the period from September 1 through November 6.
| Transaction Type | 2007 | 2008 |
|---|---|---|
| Dues | 4,636 | 4,744 |
| Events | 3,873 | 4,396 |
So there was a problem, but it wasn’t happening to enough people to help us pinpoint where it was occurring. However, with the help of a couple of very patient members, we’ve finally figured it out. There were actually three separate problems, which is why it took so long to track down the threads.
The first was a bad redirect, now fixed. The second was the renewal form itself. We tried to improve its usability but accidentally broke some code without realizing it. Again, this is fixed now. The third issue required more time to deal with, because it involved upgrading the ecommerce server to the same version of ColdFusion that the website uses. In the process, we rebuilt that server from scratch, so hopefully the software and code are both a lot cleaner now.
I think part of the problem is communication, because when people have faxed or mailed us print renewal forms in the past, one of the things they’ve told us is that they were unable to register online. We do work with librarians who truly can’t (or don’t want to) register online, but that’s different from “your website won’t let me register online.” Clearly, we need to ask better questions when someone tells us that, so please don’t be offended when we do. We know you just want to complete your transaction and move on, but we need to get a better understanding of went wrong for you. So when you report this type of problem, it helps if you can tell us the operating system for your computer, the version number of the browser you’re using so that we can try to replicate the issue, and the link you used to get to the page.
So we think all is well now, but if you run into any problems using forms on our site or encounter any slow-loading pages (especially involving ecommerce), please report them to us immediately so that we can follow up with you.
And to the member who kept trying to renew for three weeks before finally giving in and calling, thanks for being so persistent! 🙂 Seriously, though, if that happens again, please don’t wait that long to let us know you’re encountering a problem. We know you were probably giving us the benefit of the doubt because of the site redesign, and we really appreciate your repeated attempts, but no one should have to go through that kind of misery. Send us an email, use the site’s feedback form, give us a call, leave a comment on any post here, whatever – we just want to help resolve it for you.
