When live purchases are made without a paypal account through Paypal, there is no auto return, and clicking return to merchant doesn't update the cart.

No, sandbox is not the same as a live purchase made without a paypal account.

You can create a test product with a penny value, make a purchase and it will not confirm on return to merchant, or auto return.

Use a credit card, refuse to sign up if PayPal recognizes your credit card, and complete the purchase, through Paypal standard. Just configure your store to pay it to your paypal. It will not confirm, and no auto return occurs.

As I mentioned in my other thread: I called the techs at PayPal and they told me themselves. Autoreturn does not exist for non-paypal purchases.

Whether sandbox mode works or not doesn't really make a difference. It would be best if you try a live transaction so you can see what the issue is.

To clarify: Live transactions using a credit card, through Paypal, without a Paypal account do not auto-return.

As a result, SmithCart does not confirm payment, issue emails or act as though anything has happened.

After a purchase, the user is given the 'Return to Merchant' link which returns them to the cart, but since there is no confirmation of the purchase, neither the customer nor store owner receives notification save for Paypal's emails, which do not include itemization, shipping charges, order number, etc.

We fixed this issue and the hotfix is availible for v3.1 on the cart downloads page. The issue was with the paypal standard return parameters and the "PayPal Account Optional" setting in the paypal account. Returning to the cart worked fine the user used their paypal account when paying on the paypal site but if you had "paypal account optional = true" and the customer chose not to use their paypal account and pay with a credit card then paypal was returning "Return_to_Merchant" instead of returning a querystring with parameters the cart needed to determine if the paypal transaction was successful or not.

Here are the account settings that need to be set in your paypal account for the return to work correctly:

• Auto Return: On
• Return URL: Your domain name
• Payment Data Transfer: Off

Hotfix availible on the cart downloads page.

Yes that hotfix was for 3.01 what version of the cart are you running?