HTML Variables: order shipping, item notes, business ID

[JocularGargoyle]

My site is using a custom shopping cart, so I'm using the HTML variables explained on this documentation page. It's mostly going well, but I have a few questions:

1. Is it possible to use the business ID rather than an email associated with the business? (Not a huge deal, I just don't like having email addresses out there for scrapers and such.)
2. Is it possible to pass notes for an item? For example, someone orders item_name "T-shirt" and has specified in the shopping cart (saved as a string) that they want it in size small, the color red. Is there a way to pass that? I don't want them to have to make a choice at PayPal which is what the on_/os_ variables appear to be, or am I misunderstanding them?
3. Let's say shipping for all orders is $5 no matter what. Can you set shipping for an entire order? It appears you can override tax, but I don't see an option for shipping. The way I have it set now is to set shipping_1 = 5.00 and no shipping for any subsequent items, but that feels kind of inaccurate.

Thank you!

[angelleye]

1.  Yes, you can use the business/merchant account ID in place of the email address in the business parameter.

2.  If you set the name/value pair it should carry over like you're wanting.  Just include the one value that was actually selected on your end and see if that does it for you.

3.  mc_shipping should be the parameter for order shipping if I remember correctly.  Give that a try.

[JocularGargoyle]

Thank you, AngelEye! Your answer to #2 worked perfectly.

When I put the merchant ID in place of the email I get the following error after clicking the checkout button: "Things don't appear to be working at the moment. Please try again later." The code I'm using is as follows (with the actual ID, obviously):

<input type="hidden" name="business" value="MERCHANTID123">

The variable mc_shipping doesn't appear to do anything on the payment side. I searched Google for it and found document reference here but it looks like it's something that's returned, not something that's sent. I also found some references to it as a form variable but all the posts are much older. Could that have been deprecated?

Thanks!

[angelleye]

Are you sure you're using the correct value for merchant ID?  As shown in the Standard Variable Reference:

business = Your PayPal ID or an email address associated with your PayPal account.  

[angelleye]

For shipping just use shipping instead of shipping_1 and pass the entire shipping amount for the cart.  I think that'll give you what you're after.

[JocularGargoyle]

I tried passing the "shipping" value and it's not coming through either.

I'm passing the following:

<input type="hidden" name="shipping" value="4.95">

PayPal is showing this:

[JocularGargoyle]

Neither mc_shipping nor shipping appear to be coming though. This is what I get when I use mc_shipping:

 

Any other suggestions?

[JocularGargoyle]

I'm using this number from the profile page, which looks to be the one referenced... or am I misreading?