Does Shopify Work in Trinidad & Tobago?

Yes, Shopify is fully functional and widely used in Trinidad and Tobago. As a leading e-commerce solution, Shopify’s DIY platform enables local entrepreneurs and businesses to set-up and manage online stores with ease. But what Trinis really want to know is— can it accept credit card payments without having to workaround? The answer is yes, and it’s been so for years.

Curiously, it is still a popular question according to Google, so it would seem that there are some lingering doubts that have not been confirmed. Forward Multimedia has integrated our local payment gateways on several Shopify stores based in T&T and the Caribbean.

These are the two (2) most popular payment gateways offered by local banks. First Atlantic Commerce (FAC) is offered by all local banks, and Scotiabank eCom+ is only available from Scotiabank of course. There are other gateways available from T&T banks like Fygaro and CX Pay, but we haven’t had any inquiries for these, nor have we done any integration development to support these gateways.

Forward Multimedia, with our partner, has developed a Shopify private application that acts as a payment gateway. This payment gateway can be configured to work with any payment provider. The private app has been configured to work out of the box with both First Atlantic Commerce (FAC) and Scotiabank’s eCom+ payment gateway.

Payment aggregators like WiPay and PayWise that follow the PayPal model, do not have any pre-built Shopify apps like they do for the Woo Commerce platform. While it is technically possible for a developer to build such an app from their publicly available API, the cost would be around the same, if not more, than the cost to integrate FAC or Scotiabank eCom+. It would make more sense to use the bona fide payment gateways that have less limitations and more features over such payment aggregators.

It doesn’t look like they have any intention for Shopify app anytime soon as, given the growth of online stores in T&T, they would have done so already. At one time up to a few years ago, WiPay had a ‘Coming Soon’ Shopify app on their list of integrations, now it says ‘Shopify Plugin (Upgrading)’.

To their defense, Shopify makes it difficult to develop a proper working payment app one can just ‘plug and play’, as often times they make code changes without consulting developers; after all, it’s in their best interest to try to capture the percentage of credit card payments through their own platform. Translation— do not expect a Shopify app from WiPay or PayWise anytime soon.

Most businesses researching locally available online payment solutions will be familiar with Fygaro, which is an affiliate of First Atlantic Commerce. Fygaro offers their own hosted shopping platform which is similar to Shopify, and though it offers a WooCommerce payment plug-in, it does not have one for Shopify. However, First Atlantic Commerce (FAC) is available via a third party called Tilopay who is an official partner, and they have their own Shopify app. Note, you still need sign up for First Atlantic Commerce (FAC) via your bank in Trinidad & Tobago.

CX Pay, based in Curaçao is not well known locally and was officially offered by a few banks some years ago, but the current status is not confirmed. However, they do support Shopify integration.

The big question, can you get your payments in USD? The answer is yes… and no. If you use First Atlantic Commerce, Scotiabank eCom+ or PayWise, all transactions that use locally issued credit cards will be settled in ONLY TTD. The reasoning behind this is that your customers are Trinis, making their purchases from within Trinidad & Tobago so you are not technically earning foreign exchange, and have no ‘right’ to USD.

For transactions from non T&T-issued credit cards, i.e. from foreigners outside T&T, those transactions DO earn foreign exchange and you have a right to the USD you are earning. However, not all local banks see it this way.

The major local banks- First Citizens Bank, RBC Royal Bank, Republic Bank and Scotiabank do not allow you to keep USD earned from non TT-issued credit cards; this is their default policy. Depending on your relationship with the bank, it is not necessarily set in stone and could be negotiable. So generally speaking, the ability to keep your USD earned would be on a case by case basis.

Note, this keeping USD issue lies with our T&T bank policies and has nothing to do with First Atlantic Commerce. When you apply for the FAC solution at your bank, they provide the merchant account(s) denominated in the approved currencies. FAC will then configure their gateway to support those currencies.

Scotiabank does allow you to keep earned USD from on TT-used credit cards if you use their own payment gateway, Scotiabank eCom+. You’ll have to request both TTD and USD currency support when you apply. Note, with the USD forex issues at the fore of late, there may be many elements at play that could negate this policy at any time; so it’s in theory till you experience it in practice.

If you use a point of sale system to manage your inventory, and especially if you have a physical store which shares inventory with your online store, you might consider syncing your point of sale software with Shopify. This will ensure you are able to fulfil online orders without having to worry when you make an in-store sale.

Some merchants use their accounting software to manage their stock and conduct sales from their back office instead of a front-facing cash register. Similarly, they may want to manage their stock that’s going to customers from two sales channels.

The last thing you would want is an order being placed online when a customer is also buying the same item that very minute in the store— and it’s the last one! This actually happened as recently as last holiday period, and the merchant had to refund the online customer. Fortunately the customer chose a different item of lower value, and was understanding. So while probabilities of this happening are low, Murphy’s Law sometimes begs to differ, so even if you don’t sync, at least have some a manual system is place to mitigate.

Point of Sale Systems like Lightspeed (for which we are an Official Partner), Odoo, Hike, Square integrate with Shopify. However, not all have native apps, meaning that the connector is from either the POS provider or Shopify. Lightspeed’s integration for example, is native to Lightspeed, while Odoo’s is not, and only available from third party providers.

The feature of a native app is critical; it means it’s officially developed and directly supported by at least one of the two parties. In the absence of a native app, then multiple third parties are free to develop their own, and that has it’s own set of issues like cost, reliability and support.

The local Point of Sale market is now littered with many providers. There are a few larger players, but recently there have been many new entrants. Their paid ads and websites do not indicate any branding for their software, whether an international brand or their own internally developed software. Some are ‘on-premise’, i.e. installed and only accessible via your store’s computer, and some are online only. As such, you will have to ask your provider if their software integrates with Shopify, or any other shopping platform like WooCommerce for that matter.

You’ll almost certainly look for, and expect Quickbooks integration and you are correct. Shopify also supports Sage50, what we in T&T still know and refer to as Peachtree. Another popular accounting software locally is Zoho Books and it offers a Shopify integration as well. Again you’ll have to distinguish between native and third-party apps, and you’ll also have to consider the cost.

By default, Shopify offers the main international carriers like UPS, FedEx and DHL. However, that won’t apply to local businesses who are shipping out of Trinidad & Tobago. Only US and international based Trinis would be able to use the default Shopify shipping options as their warehouses will be located in their home country.

There is no default settings in the Shopify back-end to connect your DHL/FedEx/UPS accounts which you signed up for at their T&T based offices. Again, free (and paid) apps exist to connect your local DHL/FedEx/UPS account to the WooCommerce platform, but not Shopify. However, there hasn’t been any real demand for such shipping integrations as they would only be applicable if shipping outside T&T, and most stores focus on local delivery and handle that manually.

If you plan on using your local DHL/FedEx/UPS account, you’ll have to contact you account manager from the T&T offices to assist with the integration. They will normally get their regional manager involved to guide the process.

Local delivery providers really upped their game with the rise in online shopping, and one sign that the market is progressing is the ability to integrate with shopping platforms. Again, WooCommerce, being the most popular shopping cart locally and globally, is always the first recipient of any development. Both CSF Couriers and Odeliver offer a WordPress/WooCommerce plug-in to integrate your account with your online store. However, no Shopify version is available at this time.

Both couriers have developed their own API that allows for any developer to to create a third-party app or plug-in to integrate with any platform. This will be expensive of course, but it might only be a matter of time till they develop their own Shopify app.

UPSL (Universal Package Systems Limited), flies pretty much under the radar so not much is known. The big winner in local delivery is TT Post which appears reliable and heavily used by local merchants, which is surprising for a government operation. It’s very similar to the experience of the United States Postal Service (USPS) back in the day with the rise of online shopping; USPS went through a renaissance, being heavily used by Amazon at a time when traditional mail delivery was dwindling, allowing it to be relevant again. However, TT Post has no app or plug-in for any platform, nor any API, which is also not surprising for a government operation; they still haven’t rolled out our national postal codes.

Trinidad & Tobago is such a speck that we don’t need granular shipping calculations; generally flat rates are enough. In fact we already use standard rates. Ask anyone who’s shopped from a local online store and they will tell you they’ve paid anywhere from $30 TTD to $50TTD for delivery. Larger items and orders would lean towards the $50 TTD, while smaller items that might fit in a TT Post TrakPak tend to be around $30 TTD.

By default, in Shopify’s Shipping & Delivery settings, Trinidad & Tobago is a single shipping zone, and it is possible to customize rates based on item price or item weight only. And it is possible to add custom rates for groups of products. A good rule of thumb would be to not to overthink local delivery and try to use a single flat rate.

Like any other platform, Shopify offers at least the basic features you would expect from a shopping cart. There are many commonly used features we take for granted like gift cards, color pickers etc., that we assume should be standard, but they are not.

You might be able to ‘unlock’ some of these features by upgrading your plan, which is a typical marketing strategy to get you in the door with low cost but limited features. Some features, especially the less common, like say, wholesale pricing, or industry-specific, are made available through third party apps, typically for a monthly fee, but many have free limited versions with the same aforementioned catch.

A general estimate of the number of Shopify stores in Trinidad & Tobago is at least 400 according to sites that track such usage. Shopify would be the second most popular online store platform after WooCommerce which is the choice for more serious E-Commerce. Shopify is mainly for the do-it-yourselfers, and those on a budget; you would not find businesses with large catalogs, say over 10K products, opting for Shopify though it is able to handle such large stores.

So the question is finally answered, YES Shopify does work in Trinidad & Tobago.