A buyer hits your checkout and gets an error instead of a receipt. Every hour it stays broken costs you sales, so the steps below are in the order that gets it fixed fastest: confirm the scope, capture the evidence, apply the quick checks, and know exactly when to stop and hand it to us.
First: is it one buyer or every buyer?
Run a test purchase yourself (you can create a 100%-off coupon, or refund yourself afterwards). If your test works, the problem is usually on the buyer’s side: their card, their bank’s fraud check, a VPN, an expired card. If your test fails too, checkout is genuinely down: open a ticket now with the details below, and we treat it as urgent.
Capture the exact error
“Checkout doesn’t work” has a dozen possible causes; the exact message narrows it to one or two. Get the precise wording (or a screenshot) and note when it appears: before the payment fields load, after clicking Pay, or after returning from PayPal. That single detail tells us which system threw it.
Quick checks you can do
- “There was an error processing your order” after clicking Pay: usually the payment gateway rejecting the charge. Check WooCommerce → Orders: if the order exists as Failed, open it. The order notes often contain the gateway’s real reason (declined, mismatch, etc.).
- Error before payment fields even load: usually a page problem, not a payment problem. If the checkout page was edited recently (by you or your AI assistant), that’s the prime suspect; tell us what changed.
- Coupon errors: check the coupon’s expiry date, usage limits, and that it applies to the product in the cart (Marketing → Coupons).
- A specific buyer’s card fails repeatedly: have them try another card or payment method. Card declines are between the buyer and their bank; no setting on your site fixes them.
What not to touch
Don’t rebuild or re-edit the checkout page while it’s failing, and don’t change payment gateway settings to “see if it helps”. Both make diagnosis slower and can turn one problem into two. Capture the evidence first.
Your own payment method (paying Schoolyland)
Different topic, same word: if you need to update the card you pay us with (for example a card was blocked or replaced), go to My Account → Payment methods. If the update itself fails, don’t fight it: open a ticket and we’ll sort the billing side directly.
What to send us
- The exact error text or a screenshot.
- Whether your own test purchase works.
- The product or funnel where it happens, with a link.
- Roughly when it started, and what changed before that.
With those four facts, most checkout issues are resolved in one round.
