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The CCBenefit component is an advanced tool used to authorize Electronic Benefits (EBT) cards in a Retail environment, where the customer is purchasing products or services in person. This component makes authorizing EBT Food Stamp and Cash Benefit transactions (with a customer PIN) very easy. Supported Industry Types include retail stores, restaurants, and grocery stores.

NOTE: What follows is a very short description of the component interfaces. For more information, please consult the help files that come with the respective package.

Remarks

This component allows for simple, direct, secure connection to the Vital/TSYS SSL gateway through a standard Internet connection. Because all SSL communications are handled inside the component, any application or web page can be deployed without the need for expensive dedicated SSL servers.

The CCBenefit component makes authorizing EBT card transactions (where the customer's card is swiped through a card reader and a PIN is supplied) very easy by adding an additional layer of abstraction between the programmer and the protocol. There is no need to deal with raw sockets, SSL handshakes, or data packet formatting. The steps to setting up the component and authorizing a transaction are outlined below:

First, set the merchant properties with setup information acquired from your member bank or processor. For instance:

CCBenefit1.MerchantBankId = "999995" CCBenefit1.MerchantNumber = "888000002447" CCBenefit1.MerchantName = "TEST MERCHANT" CCBenefit1.MerchantTerminalNumber = "1515" CCBenefit1.MerchantStoreNumber = "5999" CCBenefit1.MerchantCategoryCode = "5999" CCBenefit1.MerchantLocation = "Durham" CCBenefit1.MerchantState = "NC" CCBenefit1.MerchantZip = "27713" CCBenefit1.MerchantTimeZone = "705" CCBenefit1.MerchantABANumber = "123456789" CCBenefit1.MerchantSettlementAgent = "V123" CCBenefit1.MerchantFCSId = "1234567" CCBenefit1.AgentBankNumber = "000000" CCBenefit1.AgentChainNumber = "111111" CCBenefit1.IndustryType = itRetail

Next, set properties that contain details about the transaction. The TransactionNumber is a sequence number, and should be incremented for each transaction you send. TransactionAmount is the amount of sale, formatted with an implicit decimal place. The CardTrack2Data is read from the magnetic stripe on the back of the card, and the CardPIN and CardKSN are retrieved from a standard DUKPT Pin Pad device.

CCBenefit1.TransactionNumber = 1 CCBenefit1.TransactionAmount = "1000" CCBenefit1.CardTrack2Data = "9999999800002773=09121015432112345678" CCBenefit1.CardPIN = "83C33384650827F6" CCBenefit1.CardKSN = "4A00310459400004"

The CCBenefit component supports both Food Stamp and Cash Benefit programs on the same card. Make sure to choose the correct TransactionType for the benefit program you wish to use, and then call the Authorize method. For example:

CCBenefit1.TransactionType = ttFoodStampPurchase CCBenefit1.Authorize()

When the component receives a response from the Vital/TSYS servers, the result of the authorization will be displayed in several Response properties. The ResponseCode indicates whether the transaction was approved, and the remaining properties provide additional information about the transaction.

Once an EBT authorization is approved, the transaction must go through the batch settlement process in order for the merchant to receive the funds in his merchant account. This is done by passing the XML aggregate returned from the GetDetailAggregate method to the CCSettle component. Usually, a Batch Settlement of all authorized transactions is done at the end of each business day. Note that ttFoodStampBalanceInquiry and ttCashBenefitBalanceInquiry TransactionTypes cannot be settled.

/n software suggests that as a matter of good business practices all merchants and third parties that store cardholder data should be aware of the Visa Cardholder Information Security Program (CISP) and the MasterCard Site Data Protection (SDP) program. The purpose of these programs is to help protect the integrity of cardholder information via the use of outside-vendor auditing of systems security and server site security.

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