BlueBox ePOS Integration with PaymentExpress PDQ/Chip-n-pin

BlueBox ePOS integrates with 3rd party PDQ/Chip-n-pin card payment solutions on a customer-requirement basis. However, we have standard plugins developed for Verifone and PaymentExpress. In this article we will run through installation and management of the PaymentExpress solution:

To enable taking card payments with PaymentExpress your till/s must have the setting for 'ccard merchantid' and 'ccard terminalid' set to 'paymentexpress'. Remember that this setting is cached when you load up BlueBox ePOS, so if you change it you will need to re-load the till-data in your current open session to get the setting loaded on the till.

You will also need to have the PaymentExpress terminal plugged in via USB into your till PC, and the PaymentExpress PC-client software installed and running as a service/tray application on the till PC.

Finally, you will need the BlueBox Websocket application installed on the till PC. This provides a vital bridge between the browser (BlueBox ePOS) and the PaymentExpress PC-client software and PDQ terminal. This can be donwloaded here and needs to be extracted into the folder c://bluebox_websocket_server (important). Once extracted into this folder follow the readme.txt file instructions to install it as a service on the till PC.

Once the above items are in place you will be ready to test out your integration with the PaymentExpress terminal.

To see whether BlueBox ePOS has detected the PaymentExpress setting as 'enabled' you can go to 'extra' > 'system' and, if enabled, a green 'Card Terminal' button will be displayed as follows:

To test the WebSocket connection click on 'Card Terminal' and you will see the card-payment interface/widget:

If the widget is gray/disabled as shown above, click on the 'Connect' button to send an 'open' message to the PaymentExpress client sofware.

If you don't get a response (spinner just spins) then your BlueBox Websocket is probably not running or has stopped. To check this you can view the Services listing on your PC to see if it is listed as 'BlueBox_Websocket_Server' - if you don't see it there then you'll need to go through the troubleshooting steps in the readme.txt file found in the folder for the websocket. If you do see it, and you still cannot connect to the PaymentExpress client software, you may need to restart/remove and re-install it.

Once you get a 'connected' message from your widget you will know that the connection is made and the two systems are talking to eachother.

Card payments and refunds are handled once you have an active sale loaded. You can capture a card payment by simply clicking on the 'Card' button while a sale is loaded, or by clicking on the Payment button and entering an amount to pay by card.

Similarly, with refunds, you simply load a 'refund sale' into the till and then click on 'Card' or 'Payment' (as described above) to make the refund onto the card.