Ubercart for Drupal

A few months ago I was able to set up a shopping cart for Drupal. I made it using Ubercart, a module you can easily install. It looks very seamless with a wide variety of payment methods. It emails you your invoice. It even has shipping cost calculations.

If you want to test it, you can check out this dummy site I made for testing the shopping cart. When calculating shipping costs, I set the pick-up address to a California 95262 zip code, so that's the origin of the package. Go ahead and try it at

http://cart.site40.net/

It's 2009!

Happy New Year to everyone! It's the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009. I also just turned 28 on January 1.

For the previous year, it was met with a lot of challenges for many of us. The recession has affected first-world countries such as the US, Canada, UK, Australia, and Singapore. There's less effect on us here in third-world countries but nevertheless the effect is there. Many Filipinos working abroad have returned to their motherland. Some have gotten laid off because of the financial crisis. Even my job hunt was not successful in Singapore, a first-world country that has a suffering economy as well.

As I'm writing this, I'm back in my motherland the Philippines. I'm currently a freelancer who's hopefully a future shareholder in a new business venture. The economy here has not changed much. Generally, companies pay as low as possible, and it seems that it's not easy to find employment that pays well based on experience, skills, and education. We just haven't reached that level in our job culture yet (my humble opinion).


Anyway, for the latest technology I've been exploring -- I recently got back to Drupal and learned more than I had at first. Drupal is viable for creating social networks, shopping carts, and point-systems (e.g. rewards for shoppers). I've tested all three features and they work. It's a growing active community with lots of modules to choose from. It's good to use for seamless integration that reduces the need to hard code. All you need to do is install the modules and activate them.

To a great year ahead...

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PayPal Philippines Can Receive Now - Part 5

Adding a bank account to your Philippine PayPal account will save a lot of money on withdrawals. It will cost 50 pesos for withdrawals less than 7,000 pesos, and nothing for withdrawals over 7,000 pesos. If you withdraw using your credit /debit card, it will cost 5 U.S. dollars (that's about 42 x 5 = 210 pesos).

I wanted to know if my Unionbank EON could be used as a bank account to withdraw funds. So I called the toll-free number, and I found out that it is also a savings account. The account number provided which is different from the debit card number is the number you need to use to register EON as a bank account. You'll see it placed below your name on the card. And make sure you have the Unionbank bank code as well. It's 010419995.

PayPal Philippines Can Receive Now - Part 4

I finally verified my PayPal account. After I opened an account with Unionbank, I waited some time before I can withdraw money from it. I was able to immediately deposit an amount of PHP 500.00, and some time later change my pin, but I had to wait longer for the withdrawal restriction to be lifted.

When my withdrawal restriction was lifted, I was able to link my PayPal account to my Unionbank debit card. PayPal charged me with 1.95 USD for this. But they promised to return the money once I entered the 4-digit PayPal code.

Before 4-digit code was entered

After 4-digit code was entered

I was also able to create an EON Cyber Account where I can check my account portfolio online. I was disappointed that after I was able to login, the PayPal code wasn't there. I later realized that it would never appear there anyway, since it's a debit card account. Upon a friend's advice, I called Unionbank's toll-free number. I waited for probably about 20 minutes until a customer service representative answered my call. I was able to obtain my 4-digit PayPal code, and today I completely verified my account. PayPal says they will refund my 1.95 USD, but it can take up to 24 hours.

PayPal Philippines Can Receive Now - Part 3

I found out that you can verify your account in Paypal using not a credit card, but a Union Bank debit card. This is possible through the use of EON, an electronic bank account that you can use anywhere online. You can apply for EON online or through your local Union Bank.

I applied for EON and it's still being processed. It takes about five working days to process.

PayPal Philippines Can Receive Now - Part 2

In my last post, I noted that PayPal in the Philippines can now receive money. Now they added a new feature that allows withdrawal from Filipino bank accounts. I received this email and to me it seems that PayPal in the Philippines has been fully launched. This is another sign of progress in the IT industry of the country.

PayPal Philippines Can Receive Now

Score one point for Philippine information technology!

Months ago, I received information that the Philippines now can participate in PayPal. But during that time, you can only send through PayPal but not receive money.

Today, I checked my e-mail and voila! I found out that Philippine PayPal accounts can now receive payments. This came in last week, and I overlooked it.

Receiving payments through PayPal is great, especially if you're doing business online and want to receive international payments. You have to pay around 250 pesos to receive money. Still, that's worth it if you're receiving 300 dollars, right?

Below is a portion of the email I received. I circled a portion for emphasis:


I haven't verified my account by entering my credit card information yet. I checked out PayPal's security and they seem to be very secure now. Last year, they were hacked, a security issue that may not occur again since they should be more vigilant by now. So far I think PayPal is secure.