Advice required(ecommerce)

[shifty_uk]

I'm currently in need of advice regarding building or pre-built ecommerce systems. I studied/interned within the industry but my knowlege is limited to that of front/user-end development. Without going into too much detail, could anyone tell me if there's any open, or closed source ecommerce applications(for commercial use) available to download or purchase? These applications must include pre-built encryption software, available to handle the transaction of personal information etc.

I have old work/student mates that work within the industry but wouldn't be able to provide the amount of time, level of service or even the cheap services that I'd like. My student buddies are also in the same position as myself.

I also have another question: Do you require any form of licence or operational costs when providing online services/using encrypted web pages etc? Besides that of regular business operation costs?

Thanks.

 

[Shoseki]

Meh, not that I'd recommend it, but Actinic is used by many for an easy of the shelf e-commerce solution. I'd like to recommend Joomla! and one of the many many shopping cart plug ins but I have not used it myself.

 

[Zaphan58]

I have used VP-ASP before which is pretty good as is the support but you have to pay for it. There are other alternatives like Zen Cart which are free but to be honest to get exactly what you want your going to need to either pay someone or learn it your self. That said most pre-built software may do what you want.

I believe there are operational costs, I think you need a payment gateway which can be set up at the bank I think. It's needed to transfer funds securely and all that sort of thing.

 

[blade007]

OS Commerce, Zen Cart are both free to use.

A step up from those is CubeCart (about £80 or so)

A step up from that is actinic (about £400ish)

Towards the top you have Monster Ecommerce.

The top in my book is White-Box-Solutions, which is a professional multi-store-fronting ecommerce system - with a price tag to match.

 

[feenster99]

If you are just wanting to setup something quickly and easily, i'd look at Shopify. I've got fairly extensive knowledge of CubeCart, and know what a pain it can be to work with.

Matt