Declined Not Last Referer

[Confuscius]

I was checking my declines for the month yesterday (seems to be an increase lately, but that is another issue!) and yet again I see the reason as 'Declined Not Last Referer' on more than one occasion. I still do not understand how these can arise. Can anyone explain this to me in general terms?

I would also like to single out one such transaction and would be grateful if this could be investigated with the Merchant concerned and a FULL explanation provided of the circumstances that led to this particular declined transaction. I would hope that this would serve to educate us all further.

The transaction details are as follows:

Merchant : La Redoute
Sale Amount : £392.40
Commission Due : £23.54
Click : 10/09/2008 21:30:13
Transaction : 14/09/2008 14:39:53
Validation : 25/09/2008 15:50:07

Any other comments, anyone?

Thanks in advance.

Paul

PS I have 4 sales for this merchant this month, all different click times and transaction times - 3 have been declined as 'Declined Not Last Referer' and one is pending - waiting to see if this one gets declined! Statistical probability is starting to cross my mind and it shouldn't be. Please put my mind at rest.

PPS I am still waiting for an explanation of the 10p sale thread and I will bump the thread tomorrow! http://www.shopwindowforum.com/showthread.php?t=882

[GeorgeGaz]

Hi Confuscius,

In regards to not being the last referrer, this basically means that you were not the site that recorded the last cookie.

For example, if a user searches Yahoo for a jacket, they come across your site, go through the merchant but for whatever reason decide not to buy. A day later they go back to Yahoo and search for the product again. They find it on an alternative affiliate site and click through and this will drop another cookie.
The last referrer then becomes the second affiliate site who will get the commissions.
This is particularly common with people searching for discount codes and so on.

We do not have any reason to believe that there is a problem with the tracking for the merchant in question. They have two forms of tracking (AWin and an independant method) to make their solution much more robust. This also makes investigations much more time consuming. I have put your query forward and have been told that it may take up to and beyond two weeks to return with an answer.

I will update you when I know more.

Cheers

[Confuscius]

The whole point is that IF a second cookie is dropped after mine then the sale would have never appeared in my account.

I believe that these declines are input manually but I may be wrong! Therefore, if I am correct, someone must have made the decline decision to decline based on me not being the last referrer. I cannot believe that it takes up to two weeks to investigate one transaction!

I have marked my diary for two weeks time!

Paul