Question

I have made an eCommerce website using php/mysql. The root currency I have used in US Dollars. Now I want to add a currency converter facility on the site so that people can check the price of their own region & their own currency & pay it. So I would like to know which is the best method for integrating currency converter tool on eCommerce website?

Answer 1

This entirely depends on your eCommerce platform. Is it one you’ve created yourself? Based on a framework? What?

Anyway, the easiest way to do this on the majority of eCommerce systems I’ve worked on is to just convert any instance of price into the new currency. The general process is:

1. Set currency in session/cookie
2. Have a lookup table of currency conversions stored somewhere (e.g. database) – a good free XML lookup table which is updated daily can be found here
3. When you go to output a price anywhere on the site, convert it into the new price using the lookup table depending on whichever currency is set in your session/cookie.
4. Depending on your payment processor, you may only be able to send them the price in one currency, if so then there is no need to do any conversion (as your basket should be in your original currency already).

but as I said, it’s heavily dependent on what eCommerce platform you are using.