Category: Custom Orders

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International Payments Now Accepted

This website was a bit rushed when created, and there is still lots of work to do. One of the biggest challenges has figuring out the best way to handle orders from those of you not located in the United States. As it has turned out, the entire time I have been able to accept international payments, I just hadn’t read enough of the support docs to realize.

If you are placing an ordering from outside the US, please reach out if there are any issues. I am trying to make for the most efficient and streamlined ordering process I can, and customer feedback is immensely important.

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Payment plans now available on custom orders

I am very excited to announce that I can now offer various payment plans to clients making orders for custom jewelry! By making use of subscriptions, a feature built into WordPress (the platform my website and store is built around) it is now possible to break your order up into bite size weekly or monthly automatic payments. This works like any other subscription based service online, and only needs to be set up once. Plans will be for a specific duration of time so as not to over or under charge. From you account dashboard you can keep track of your payments, cancel at any time, update shipping and billing info, and see previous orders.

With lead times 6-8 weeks on average, consider spreading your total across that time frame! To give you an example of what that looks like. Say your order is $300. If you broke that up across 6 payments each week, that is only $50 a week, or $37.50 at 8 weeks! Or monthly, three months at $100.

Not only is this a great way to get that dream pair of stone plugs. This is a new practical way for you to save! That’s right, you don’t have to be ready to place an order. Perhaps you know that you would like to sometime in the near future but have a hard time setting aside what you need. With subscriptions, you can accumulate a credit with Stone Soup Lapidary that can be applied directly to your order! Because a registered account is required to take advantage of payments, you will have access to a dashboard that tracks all of your payments, orders, shipping, and billing information!

The Fine Print: Being able to offer payments in this way is a a privilege I am able to make available to clients. Due the nature of being a very small business, and payments being an advantage to you when ordering, all payments received are NON-REFUNDABLE. Subscriptions/Payments can be cancelled at any time with no penalties. After cancelling a subscription prematurely, all payments made will be considered credit on your account for 6 months for when you are ready to order.

Please, if you have any questions, comments, or concerns with this new avenue for ordering, leaving us a comment! I’d love to have feed back.

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Order form maintenance and updates.

Hey everyone, just a quick update. The custom order form is currently functioning half way, however submissions are not being properly forwarded to me for review. I can still access submissions from the database, so nothing is lost. While I work to repair this feature, please exercise a little bit of patience with my replies.

As well, while navigating through the website, if you come across anything you think may be an error, please report it by sending in an email on the contact page. Trying my best to keep things running smoothly!

Reminder, for the latest news regarding jewelry, or the website, you should be following me on Instagram. I make the most use of story posts, and regular posts showcasing finished products and work in progress. As there are updates to the site, I will post about them on Instagram first. So give a follow, and check back often for updates.

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Things To Look Out For In The Shop

Hey everyone, I just wanted to quickly bring up custom items in the store for anyone just browsing. This is a bit of a continuation or follow up from the last post. As I learn how to properly make use of all the features WordPress and WooCommerce have to offer, you might see something from time to time in the shop with a name or order number paired with an oddly specific price. Currently I have yet to figure out how to hide customer specific items from public view. The best I can do at this time is password protect these listings so that they can not be accidentally purchased.

Going back to my issues with PayPal, the main focus of this website is streamlining the payment and ordering process for all clients, as well as avoiding unrealistic holds and freezes on my accounts by not making use of their services. With apple pay, google pay, and the ability to punch in your credit card, it is much easier to process payment, as well, running everything through the site is keeping me much more organized already!

For those of you making use of breaking up payment with a 50% (non-refundable) deposit, you can expect to purchase two separate blank items from the store. Currently I am working on learning to receive partial payments on single items. Until I come to a resolution, please exercise patience and understanding for this new learning curve.

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A New Chapter

If you have ordered from me in the past or follow me on Instagram you know that my order process has been evolving quite a bit the past year. I went from creating my own custom invoices in a word processor, to making use of invoicing through PayPal, and now once again generating my own invoices through my book keeping program. As a the likely Instagram follower you are, you would be aware that in the past few weeks I have been having severe issues with both PayPal and Venmo. As a result of multiple account suspensions and freezes for very arbitrary reasons, and more on the way, I have no choice but avoid using those payment processing services. To these companies, I say thank you! Thank you for not making an effort to retain my business! The solution is here in this website.

Not only is there a custom order form to use streamlining the process from the beginning, but payment can be accepted directly on the website. For My international Clients PayPal may indeed still remain the best option, but be assured I am seeking alternatives.

So here’s how it’s going to work moving forward: First submit your request. Quotes are not automatically generated. I will receive an Email with all of your information and be able to accurately quote you a price from there. After you have received the quote, I need confirmation that you are ready to proceed. At this point I will list a custom item in the store, specifically for YOU. 50% Deposit will be required within 7 Days. Full payment within 30 days.

As I continue to build this store out, certain features may get better in time. Other features may prove themself worthless and be phased out. When it comes to 50% deposits, It is looking like I will have to list two separate Items, as I’ve yet to realize partial payments through this new platform.

If you have made it this far, thank you! For the TLDR crowd, my next big task is setting up an FAQ page, so stay tuned, or try reading this all the way through on your next visit. 🙂