Challenge
A global wholesale management software company needed assistance integrating a new payment provider into their point-of-sale payment application. This platform is used by thousands of retailers and brands, processes billions of dollars in transactions annually, and has various complexities such as long order processing times, different currencies, and third-party platform integrations.
The integration had to be done while simultaneously allowing transactions to continue with the old provider. The project required experienced developers who could embrace a highly complex tech stack while coordinating the work of both the company’s and the payment provider’s development teams.
The company was also working with Six Feet Up on another project: “Optimizing a Wholesale Platform for Accelerated Growth.” This existing relationship helped cement that Six Feet Up had the expertise and was the right partner to help with the app integration.
Implementation Details
Proof of Concept
Six Feet Up acted as project managers, working with both the payment provider and wholesaler’s development teams to ensure a smooth integration. The integration needed to allow over 10,000 retailer clients to continue using the old payment provider while other brands and retailers switched to the new provider without interrupting daily transactions.
This complex integration required Six Feet Up's developers to have a full understanding of the application’s complex tech stack which featured a Flask and Django backend, paired to a React frontend using Typescript and GraphQL.
The Six Feet Up team then worked with the payment provider’s developers to build out the list of features requested by the wholesaler, including adding refund transactions to the new platform. Meanwhile, on the wholesaler end, the Python app that stores transactions in the wholesaler’s database had to be modified to record transactions as paid or declined based on the webhooks used to communicate a transaction’s success to users.
Specifically, Six Feet Up helped develop an application that could:
- accept currencies from a multitude of countries,
- process transactions quicker,
- provide more information and editing functionality for invoices; and
- better protect businesses with fraud control and security validation.
Beta Testing and Integration
To build the application, Six Feet Up’s experts used Docker Compose for local development and Kubernetes for preview environments, before implementing manual tests and automated end-to-end testing with Datadog and Cypress. The extensive testing process included a beta program where specific clients could test using the new payment provider before it was made generally available.
To allow some brands and retailers to continue using the original payment provider while others migrated to the new one, Six Feet Up helped implement feature flags. This technique had already been used by the wholesaler’s development team to differentiate functionality between retailers and brands for other applications, so using it to manage the implementation was a natural extension of its capability.
Throughout the development and testing process, Six Feet Up was in close communication with the payment provider’s development team, helping them identify missing documentation and make technical improvements to their stack.
Results
The integration was completed without any disruption to the wholesaler’s daily transactions. Standard currency exchange rates are now offered in-app, resulting in fewer charges between conversions from currency to currency. This change is also reflected in the frontend with new functionality developed alongside the wholesaler’s UI/UX team. The new application offers more flexibility, including more information and editing functionality for invoices, and the ability to download a PDF version of each invoice.
Six Feet Up's expertise enabled the company to expand its payment provider options, which has led to increased revenue streams and improved the overall user experience — all within the span of a year.
“The biggest ROI of using Six Feet Up is productivity,” said the SVP of Engineering at the global wholesale management software provider. “It's really great to see that we can deliver something to production, do it relatively quickly and see the benefits.”
