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Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

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Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#91
post #34
post #16

Which prompts the question - should you bother signing up for Google Wallet (if applicable, i.e. digital goods only). Since that may just end up suffering the same fate.

I think it's safe to say that Google will not be getting out of payments any time soon. Wallet is already tied into the enormous Play Store, so they certainly have a healthy userbase, and seeing as Google primarily is a digital services company it makes more sense for them to not target physical goods.

I don't think one should read much into them needing Wallet internally.

Google needing to accept credit card transactions for the Play Store is almost tangential to the service: offering a supported API to 3rd party merchant-users for processing digital goods transactions.

The latter involves risk assessment, underwriting, customer support, maintaining card association/acquirer relationships, so on.

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#92
post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My startup for a time being was only using Google Checkout. Here lies the problem. Can't trust Google with building APIs when they reorganize. This is surprising to me, but I wonder if Google Maps could close down....

That's insane, maps collects huge amounts of data, google's raw material.

But you'd have to assume that Checkout also collected lots of raw data about people and their purchasing habits. It wasn't as if nobody used the service, it just wasn't the most popular.

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but how many business was using Google Checkout as only method of payment? This decision will hurt only those businesses. Rest of businesses using Google Checkout will remove one of payments method. Not a big deal, and we may guess that this method was probably not so popular already.

I had a client that used Google Checkout as the only method of payment. It's not rare. It is a mom & pop (truly) web site selling products online.

Indeed. I did a similar setup years and years ago for a mom and pop shop (well before Braintree and Stripe) and I had to choose between Paypal and Google Checkout. Glad I set them up with Paypal.

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#94
post #70
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, even PayPal screws up recurring billing.

After having integrated nearly a hundred payment services: To be fair, recurring billing is hard.

Care to share an opinion on who does it best? Or least worst?

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but how many business was using Google Checkout as only method of payment? This decision will hurt only those businesses. Rest of businesses using Google Checkout will remove one of payments method. Not a big deal, and we may guess that this method was probably not so popular already.

My startup for a time being was only using Google Checkout. Here lies the problem. Can't trust Google with building APIs when they reorganize. This is surprising to me, but I wonder if Google Maps could close down....

Mapping is such a core part of the mobile OS experience I can't see them shuttering it. Separate from that, they use it to show ads and promote their other services (like Google Plus).

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#96

If you think Google shuts down APIs this quickly and casually now, wait until after the stock market bubble bursts.

This will have no noticeable effect on quarterly results. Same for other notable shutdowns like Google Reader or any of the various APIs shuttered in 2011 (Translate, Finance, Code Search, etc etc).

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#97

I can't imagine ever building something that relies on a Google service at this point. There is a lot of collateral damage when they do things like this, damage that hurts them when even when it comes to developers like me who've never written a single line of code that integrates with Google Checkout.

As someone previously burned by this business model, let me be the first to tell you how right you are. I built a small business around their SOAP search API some seven years ago, and received a commercial license and increased API usage to bring my product to market.

After easily lining up enough customers to exceed my daily limit, I lobbied for higher usage and a method to share the revenue (they had no structure to charge for API calls back then). For years I tried to contact anyone I could within the organization, but there was no response. After an eternity, they simply shut it down with no notice.

You just never know how long they're going to enjoy experimenting with their APIs, and unless you have a backup plan, it's a deal breaker.

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#99
post #62

This actually solves a problem for me. For a long time, "finish Google Checkout recurring billing integration" was on my todo list. Just didn't get to it due to limited time and confusing documentation. Now I can simply close that ticket.

Stripe recurring billing is pretty straightforward

Re: Google Checkout Closing Down on Nov. 20th

#100
post #94
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After having integrated nearly a hundred payment services: To be fair, recurring billing is hard.

Care to share an opinion on who does it best? Or least worst?

Can't really pick a best. The reason why I write that recurring billing is hard is because the business cases vary so widely, so the answer is usually: It depends (on your location, userbase, what you're selling...). I started out writing a couple of integrations and you think "hey, why are there so many processors, that's unnecessary!". And then you do a couple dozen and you start to see the picture.

I CAN definitely tell you how to spot the worst, though. In general, when you read the documentation and get the creeping feeling like the API was written for one big client (and their weird business logic) and then they just packaged it up and resold it, badly.

Funnily enough, Google Checkout seemed to be like that to me - for instance, usually you have two things to specify: Time unit and amount of your billing cycle, like "recur every 4 days". Google Checkout didn't do that, no no, much too simple. They only had a time unit - one of: daily, weekly, semi_monthly, monthly, every_two_months, quarterly, yearly.

And that's not the most complex "let us structure time awkwardly" example I have seen over the years. Other services only allow for "days" as time unit and you have to figure out a way to do monthly billing that doesn't just keep running away. My favorite so far was the one where it's basically "day, week, month, quarter, half-year and year". The values for that? D, W, M, Q, 6, Y. Can't make this stuff up.

Other red flags: No English documentation, no public documentation, documentation that specifies variables without data types, unsafe notification functions (not even a shared secret) or downright exotic "security" (I have seen black-box .dll files distributed as security callbacks... oh the horror)... I could go on.

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