free trial without credit card

Discussion in 'Pre-Sales Questions' started by patr, Jul 10, 2004.

  1. patr

    patr Guest

    Hi,
    I'm very interested in purchasing this product for my client's site. I'm planning on using Mambo so I'm glad to see an integration plugin available. My question is if it is possible to offer free trials to my users without requiring them to use their credit cards? For example, they can register as a "premium user" and get a 1 month free trial. After that, if they decide to, they have to use their credit card to subscribe for a 1 year period (and possible recurring each year).

    Is this possible? Hopefully my description was clear, if not I can try and rephrase it.

    Thanks in advance,
    -Patrick
  2. tradermike

    tradermike New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 14, 2004
    Messages:
    8
    What about fraud?

    How do you plan to stop people from simply creating new "trial" accounts and never actually paying?

    There are a lot of mean people out there that will take advantage of this loophole.

    **********
    But to answer your question, it will partially depend on which payment plugin(s) you are using. However, I believe only the "free" plugin will let someone through w/o capturing their email.

    You may be able to do something tricky by applying various configurations for "scope", "trial" and "require another subscription" options in the product definition window.

    **********
    I know, not much help. I would encourage you to re-evaluate what you are trying to accomplish and why. I don't see a strong reason not to take their billing info if you're using a "trial" setup. They will never be charged if they cancel. I also don't see how to prevent people from abusing the method you are looking for.
  3. alex

    alex aMember Pro Customer Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 24, 2004
    Messages:
    6,021
    It is possible to do, but tradermike is absoltely right - there is no ways to deterimine if user signup again and again. He can register new email and use new name each time.

    If he is forced to enter credit card for trial, then there are ways to stop it.

    P.S. Look at this situation from another side - if visitor is not ever going to pay, why could you be interested in this visitor?
  4. regan

    regan New Member

    Joined:
    Sep 9, 2004
    Messages:
    6
    Free trial

    Did anyone get a result with this? Ive been trying to set up a free trial service without any luck. I have 3 groups of products, Registration, Free trial and Subscription. The Registration gives access to Bollywood movie trailers for free to anyone. The Free trial is a 7 day unlimited access trail and the Subscription is a monthly/annual fee for unlimited access.

    The Free trial doesn't really work because if I set it on Sign-up page only then users cannot 'Register' because I also only want Register on sign-up page only. There is conflict of logic in the two settings. :confused:

    Regan
    www.bollywood.tv
  5. alex

    alex aMember Pro Customer Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 24, 2004
    Messages:
    6,021
    The Free trial doesn't really work because if I set it on Sign-up page only then users cannot 'Register' because I also only want Register on sign-up page only. There is conflict in the two criteria.

    Could you please translate it into some example? :) I would appreciate if you copy&paste error messages/etc. These words above provide zero information about your issue.
  6. regan

    regan New Member

    Joined:
    Sep 9, 2004
    Messages:
    6
    Ignore the subscription for now, lets focus on the 'Free Trial' and 'Register'

    'Free Trial' gives my users a free sample of what is in the subscription service.
    'Register' gives users access to free content, movie trailers in my case.

    I don't want 'Register' to be offered to subscribers as they get 100% access to all protected directories anyway (I use PHP-include with Mod-rewrite)

    Ideally I want user to:
    1 - Register
    2 - Use free trial
    3 - Subscribe

    So the question really is where do I put the Free Trial, it cannot go on the Sign up page, but if it goes on the Members page then it could be re-ordered.

    One solution may be to have manual confirmation on the Free Trial, but I understand this cannot be set for individual products.

    Is this clear? It's a difficult concept to explain without a working model which I dont have.

    Regan
  7. alex

    alex aMember Pro Customer Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 24, 2004
    Messages:
    6,021
    It is possible to configure if you allow free trial, but require entering credit card info.
    Second question - which payment processors are you using?
  8. regan

    regan New Member

    Joined:
    Sep 9, 2004
    Messages:
    6
    1 - WorldPay
    2 - PayPal

    I see the trial options in PayPal but I understand there are technical problems with WP, I don't want to offer a trial on one payment system and not another.

    Regan
  9. alex

    alex aMember Pro Customer Staff Member

    Joined:
    Jan 24, 2004
    Messages:
    6,021
    It is impossible to setup validated free trials with these payment systems.

    This way, I could signup for trial again and again, and there are no ways to stop it. So, in fact, it is something very close to your "Register" option.

    If you would use payment system like LinkPoint or Authorize.Net, it could be possible to require credit card details for subscribe to free trial. This way we could identify customer, and stop repeating subscriptions to free trial. With PayPal and WorldPay, it is impossible.
  10. sarah23

    sarah23 New Member

    Joined:
    Dec 8, 2009
    Messages:
    15
    Thanks for the info.
  11. thehpmc

    thehpmc Member

    Joined:
    Aug 24, 2006
    Messages:
    901
    Sarah you might like to check if this information is still current. It may be I have no idea.

    Just be aware that you have extracted information from a forum thread dated 2004.

    There have been a lot of changes in those 6 years.

Share This Page