set transaction_subject PayPal IPN

Question

Does anyone know how to set the transaction_subject in the return IPN from PayPal.

At the moment it is returning with the same content as my custom field even though the PayPal doc's say the following:

"Pass-through variable for your own tracking purposes, which buyers do not see. Default – No variable is passed back to you. "

I need this to be different from the custom field because the transaction_subject is showing in the email that the buyer gets, which means they are seeing the contents of the custom field.

Thanks

Answer 1

It seems the PayPal developers on X.commerce do not know the purpose of the transaction_subject variable or how to set it. Even PayPal's sample IPN message (table near bottom) provides no notes about the variable. Finally, PayPal's IPN & PDT Variables and Payments Standard HTML Variable Reference do not list it.

In parsing our IPNs, transaction_subject always contains the value of the custom pass-through variable, but I am unaware that either are shown to the buyer.

Setting transaction_subject using NVP within the HTML form has no effect on its value.

Contact merchant technical support because a "pass-through" variable displaying to the buyer is a bug.