Prestashop in the real world (EU and local customers) - serious flaws

[hansblaauw]

I'm now working with Prestashop for a long time but I must say some parts of the system system have serious flaws for any business that wants to automate all. In most EU countries we are bound to strict ecommerce rules.

 

Below my remarks:

 

Invoices

The biggest problem with the invoicing system is that created invoices are not "frozen" in their state when they are generated. That means that when changes occur or are made all invoices are changed to these new settings. Imagine this scenario: at a certain date we decide to change a few settings for invoicing. These changes should only apply to newly generated invoices because old invoices are already received by customers. This is a problem, when changing settings a customer that logs in again also gets the new invoice layout, that is very very wrong according to the strict rules we have in the EU. If a company gets an audit by the VAT organisation this is a real tricky situation.

 

After an upgrade you cannot actually freeze old invoices, this has disaster written all over the place. An option to disable invoice access on a per customer base would solve it.

 

In version 1.5.4.1 there are also rounding errors on invoices which is a big problem. Especially orders without shipment get rounding errors in the range of 5 eurocent. Have checked v 1.5.6. but seems to be the same problem. Again, cannot test the upgrade for real because it changes all existing invoices again.

 

Another problem is if you switch off invoice access for customers, currently it disables automatic invoice sending but also invoice access. These need to be two options: enable invoice emailing, enable customer portal access to invoices.

 

Multiple customer types

PS does not handle this 100% perfectly. On account creation we cannot assign customer groups or tax groups. I want to have groups based on: EU customer with VAT number, local customer, EU customer without VAT number etc. This is not arranged in a proper way and so it can happen that a EU customer sees some VAT mentions on his invoice which is wrong. I have tried and tested every single option but for an EU customer with VAT number there is still VAT mentioned in the head of the invoice (product incl. VAT and product excl. VAT) lines.

 

B2B

It is very unclear how B2B can solve above problems, have tested it but not sure what it exactly does besides new fields and price management. Some of the new fields are actually only needed in France :-) Much more info would be welcome.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[tuk66]

I think I have successfully solved all your observations. Let me explain some.

 

First, you shouldn't change the order after creating invoice - which is mostly after receiving payment.

 

The M4 Extensions module fixes rounding, tax, amount and after-upgrade issues. Invoices are always created from orders (even in PS 1.5 and 1.6), amounts are recalculated to be more precise. The layout remains the same in all PrestaShop versions as well.

 

No need for special VAT/non-VAT groups. When the shop is properly configured and taxes are correctly stored according to customer's country and VAT registration, invoices automaticaly show the tax breakdown, taxes and messages or don't.

 

All invoices created at www.presta-addons.com use this approach and no one accountant has complained yet, so I think it is right.

[hansblaauw]

Not sure if you understand the problem. I'm not changing orders at all. My biggest problem is that if I change something in the system (for example how stuff is displayed on the invoice) prestashop generates all invoices when a customer requests this invoice through the portal again. This is very wrong in my opinion, invoices that are generated should NEVER change. So changes in the system should only apply for newly generated invoices otherwise you can never make any changes.

 

One other big issue is the invoice sending and portal access. Right now it isn't possible to have these two seperated which is a pain in my opinion. I want to have a status to manually send an invoice which then also becomes available for the customer online.

 

This is really a big issue and I know many people who sell B2B and B2C have these problems, I don't think PS is going to solve it.

 

PS hasn't actually been able to create a guide on how to do all these settings for these situations, which is a shame. They don't explain in detail what B2B mode exactly does and how all fields in an invoice relate to a setting.

 

Cheers.

[tuk66]

Of course, you are right. Many things, settings and required procedures are not clear and well documented.

 

I just mean that many issues are resolvable. One example - the invoice sending and portal access:

 

The invoice is created and sent to the customer by email when order status is set to "Payment accepted". It is an automatic action for PayPal and credit card payments - I think it is all right. You can set this status manually for the Bankwire payment and your requirements are fulfilled as well - then invoice is created and sent.