How do I submit an address to Paypal Express Checkout? - php

Question

I'm in the process of writing some code that will submit an order to Paypal Express Checkout. Unforunately I can't seem to get the whole address thing to work, and I also can't seem to find much info on it in the API docs. Here's my code so far.
$config = array (
'mode' => 'sandbox' ,
'acct1.UserName' => '****removed*****',
'acct1.Password' => '******removed*******',
'acct1.Signature' => '*********removed***********'
);
$paypalService = new PayPal\Service\PayPalAPIInterfaceServiceService($config);
$paymentDetails= new PayPal\EBLBaseComponents\PaymentDetailsType();
// Dummy shipping address
// Obviously, in the final version, this would be passed in from a form
$shipping_address = new PayPal\EBLBaseComponents\AddressType();
$shipping_address->Name = "John Smith";
$shipping_address->Street1 = "123 Market Street";
$shipping_address->Street2 = "";
$shipping_address->CityName = "Columbus";
$shipping_address->StateOrProvince = "OH";
$shipping_address->PostalCode = "43017";
$shipping_address->Country = "US";
// A dummy item
// Once again, in a final version this would be passed in
$itemDetails = new PayPal\EBLBaseComponents\PaymentDetailsItemType();
$itemDetails->Name = 'Electro Lettuce Feeders';
$itemAmount = 1250.00;
$itemDetails->Amount = $itemAmount;
$itemQuantity = 1;
$itemDetails->Quantity = $itemQuantity;
// Add all items to the list
$paymentDetails->PaymentDetailsItem[0] = $itemDetails;
// The company is in NYS, so in the final version the
// sales tax rate will be passed in (NYS is destination-based)
$sales_tax_rate = 0.07;
// Order sub-total
$itemTotal = new PayPal\CoreComponentTypes\BasicAmountType();
$itemTotal->currencyID = 'USD';
$itemTotal->value = ($itemAmount * $itemQuantity);
// Shipping total
$shippingTotal = new PayPal\CoreComponentTypes\BasicAmountType();
$shippingTotal->currencyID = 'USD';
$shippingTotal->value = 2.00;
// Tax total
$taxTotal = new PayPal\CoreComponentTypes\BasicAmountType();
$taxTotal->currencyID = 'USD';
$taxTotal->value = $itemTotal->value * $sales_tax_rate;
// Order total
$orderTotal = new PayPal\CoreComponentTypes\BasicAmountType();
$orderTotal->currencyID = 'USD';
$orderTotal->value = $itemTotal->value + $taxTotal->value + $shippingTotal->value;
$paymentDetails->TaxTotal = $taxTotal;
$paymentDetails->ItemTotal = $itemTotal;
$paymentDetails->ShippingTotal = $shippingTotal;
$paymentDetails->OrderTotal = $orderTotal;
$paymentDetails->PaymentAction = 'Sale';
// ***** Is the address from this object passed to Paypal?
$paymentDetails->ShipToAddress = $shipping_address;
$setECReqDetails = new PayPal\EBLBaseComponents\SetExpressCheckoutRequestDetailsType();
$setECReqDetails->PaymentDetails[0] = $paymentDetails;
$setECReqDetails->CancelURL = 'https://devtools-paypal.com/guide/expresscheckout/php?cancel=true';
$setECReqDetails->ReturnURL = 'https://devtools-paypal.com/guide/expresscheckout/php?success=true';
// ***** Or is this the address that will be passed to Paypal?
$setECReqDetails->Address = $shipping_address;
// ***** And can you choose to not pass in the billing address? Or is it required? *****
$setECReqDetails->BillingAddress = $shipping_address;
// ***** If this is set to 0, will the previously provided shipping address be shown
// ***** at all? Or will it just be "modify-able" unless you set this to 1?
$setECReqDetails->AddressOverride = 1;
$setECReqType = new PayPal\PayPalAPI\SetExpressCheckoutRequestType();
$setECReqType->Version = '104.0';
$setECReqType->SetExpressCheckoutRequestDetails = $setECReqDetails;
$setECReq = new PayPal\PayPalAPI\SetExpressCheckoutReq();
$setECReq->SetExpressCheckoutRequest = $setECReqType;
$setECResponse = $paypalService->SetExpressCheckout($setECReq);
//var_dump($setECResponse);
$redirect_url = "https://www.sandbox.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_express-checkout&token=".$setECResponse->Token;
return $app->redirect($redirect_url);
Summed up...
You'll see my questions distributed throughout the code, but here they are all summed up.
Both PaymentDetailsType() and SetExpressCheckoutRequestType() have address-ish properties. Which one will be passed on to Paypal?
Does the API require that you pass in a billing address if you pass in a shipping address?
If you don't set AddressOverride to 1, should it show the address that you passed in at all?
But in the end, I most importantly just want to know how to get address passing to work. =). Right now I can't seem to get any address to pass to Paypal no matter what I try.

Answer 1

It would help more to see the raw API requests getting generated as opposed to the code generating the requests. The library you're using should give you some way to see that. Then you just need to make sure the address parameters are getting passed correctly in DoExpressCheckoutPayment.
If you like, you might want to take a look at my PHP class library for PayPal. Might kinda suck to start over with another library, but it makes it very quick and easy. It has files prepared with all the parameters and everything ready to go so all you need to do is fill in the values and it'll work every time. :)

Answer 2

After some furious research, I was able to figure out the problem using Paypal's API explorer. As it turns out, setting ->Address on the SetExpressCheckoutRequestType() object is deprecated. The correct method is to set ->ShipToAddress for your PaymentDetailsType() object.
In my case, however, the reason that nothing was working was because I had my address wrong [slaps palm into forehead]. My zip, while in the region of Columbus, OH is technically in Dublin, OH. So, Paypal was generating an error.
Paypal wasn't showing me error information, however, so I had no way to know what in particular was causing the error. This is where the API explorer came in handy; I filled in the API explorer and tried my request--and it gave me detailed error information.
Since then, I've also found out that I can see detailed error information simply by using:
var_dump($setECResponse);