Some customers do not fill in the phone number field. How do I require this field?

Hi, that is a required field.
Customers can bypass with a few taps of the spacebar though.
Really there is not much that can be done to force that. They can always enter a false number too.

Thanks,
David

Has there been any further solutions to this issue?

If not, where can I change the text from "Phone" to something else, like "Phone Number Required"?

Hi Charlotte

Head to vsadmin/inc & locate the file languagefile_en.php. There is a line that should read $GLOBALS['xxPhone']='Phone'; edit the red text and put that line in your includes.php file. The line in the includes file will not be over written in any updaters in the future

Steve
Egerton Village, Bolton, UK

Thanks, Steve

This is still a problem for us. Is there another way to emphasize that the phone number is required, adding text or maybe a popup to the order form?

Are they leaving it blank?
What are customers doing?

David

Yes, blank.

Hi Charlotte

You could further edit the line to read $GLOBALS['xxPhone']='Phone - Number MUST be supplied or shipment will be delayed'; which would show as below. You could also make a point of calling the number to satisfy you it's a valid number.



Steve
Egerton Village, Bolton, UK

I tried writing in "Phone Number Required". But that did not work. I'll try your suggestion. Thank you.

I think Steve's idea is a good step.
If that does not help, add a banner really large at the top of the page.
I don't think any code changes will help really as it's still possible to enter random numbers if you force a certain number of digits, etc...

David

Bringing this to the top. My installation is .asp, and I know this is the PHP area, but the issue is the same.

We recently updated two stores after some time, and suddenly we are seeing orders where customers are leaving the phone field blank on both sites. Literally tens of thousands of orders for years with the phone field completed, and now we're seeing some orders without it.

The only thing different in our stores is the update. It feels to me that something happened that made it easier to skip. Testing now, I see the field does not require anything to be in it to check out. Is that different? Seems like it could at least require something be in there, even if it wasn't validated.

I get that we can put text strongly urging entry, but can't we also have a way to verify the field isn't empty?

Hi Philip,

quote:

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Testing now, I see the field does not require anything to be in it to check out. Is that different? Seems like it could at least require something be in there, even if it wasn't validated.

---

If no characters are entered in the phone field the user will be alerted with a pop up asking to enter data.



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I let this sit awhile to get more orders, and clearly most orders now come without phone numbers. I can't recall ever getting an order without a phone number prior to this last update.

I tested trying to not enter a phone number, and as you said, a window popped up.

I then tried using paypal express, and though I didn't complete the order, I also didn't need to check out through ecommerce, so I never got the phone number challenge.

I just checked the last 10 orders. 8 were paypal express and all 8 have no phone number. The two that are not paypal express, have phone numbers.

With this clue, I looked at orders directly before and after the update. This change happened exactly on the date of the update.

I made no changes to paypal setup in the store.

It feels like the update messed this up somehow.

Thoughts?

Hi Philip
In your paypal account can you make sure that "Require Phone Number" is set...
https://www.paypal-community.com/t5/My-account-settings-Archive/How-do-I-require-a-phone-number-from-my-customers/td-p/356200

Vince

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Thanks. I have set it now.

The change by the way was that we now honour that PayPal account setting. If your PayPal account says to not require a phone number then a Phone Number is not required in the cart etc.

Vince

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Thanks for the detail behind it. Makes sense.