ViArt Shop Review
Review this cart!
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| Company name |
ViArt Ltd |
| Product name |
ViArt Shop |
| Version |
3.6 |
| Sample customer sites |
http://www.claxtonfruitcake.com/
http://www.officesupermarket.co.uk/
http://www.regentaudio.com/
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| Price |
$US149 |
| Average review score |
(15) |
| User reviews |
Reviewed by: Gerald
"Unsupported. Unless (and maybe even if you have) just a trivial problem expect absolutely no support from ViArt. Their forums are full of unanswered questions and they simply ignore requests for support. Their system is OK (if overcomplicated and looking well out of date). Big Achilles heal is their CMS which is "State of the Arc" and is way wayunderpowered: no support for headings etc. or styles."
 
Review date: May, 2010 Version reviewed: 3.6
Reviewed by: Vi
"Viart has a lot of nice features, but has some significant shortcomints.
I have worked on 4 viart shopping cart based sites over the last 6 months, and can conclusively say that I will never choose Viart again.
Here are the reasons why.
1. Their support is horrible. While the company is located in the UK, their support staff are in Eastern Europe, and do not speak English as their native tongue. We paid an additional $99 for 3 months support, and their response to at least half of our (paid support) requests were: "Pay us $X and we will fix that for you." This is a recurring theme if you google viart support.
2. Their HTML code is cludgy and old. Their templating system, and code generated by the underlying viart framework is not up to todays coding standards. It is full of unnecessary tables, and cost us a bunch of time rewriting code blocks so that the code was clean.
3. Their documentation is out of date, and severely lacking. Important information is missing, including how to interface with their environment variables, or even what they are. Do not expect any information on doing custom coding from their staff. They will just respond with, "Pay us and we will do it for you."
4. User interface on their admin section is severely obfuse. The learning curve on the interface is pretty steep. The WYSIWIG editor is pretty lame, and a lot of the interface is counterintuitive.
On the whole, the features of viart are nice. I love the product winnowing, and we created some nice websites, but their deficiencies in support and maintenance are too much for me to ever consider them again."
Review date: December, 2009 Version reviewed: 3.6
Reviewed by: Javier
"First off documentation and support is VERY bad. You are basically on your own if you want to do anything custom including the look of your site. Users have even gone so far as providing a separate forum that you have to pay for to get better documentations for the software. On this end the cart is incomplete. On the other hand the features are very good and powerful…."
Review date: November, 2009 Version reviewed: 3.6
Reviewed by: Laszlo
"I've use this cart for 1,5 years. I've done a full company portal and webshop rebuild with this sw in 2007. The resoults was really impressing: We had about 50% more orders in the first month, and later this was 100%. Also the phone calls was increased into a hudge amount.
In 2009 I built 3 shops based on Viart system, and use the great multisite feature: 1 admin area, and 3 shops. I think they need to work on some little things, like footer links restriction for sites, but this is the cart what I really suggest to everyone, who want to make professional shops in an easy and fast way.
The support is good. I cant say excellent, cause they have a small team, when a new release is available, everyone working on this. Oh men! This is the reason, why the software is very cheap!
I think they are in a good way, they started to publish patches in a separated section to let customers see when is an apdate available. I think this will be enough - I dont want to get notofications in every update/patch."
Review date: July, 2009
Reviewed by: Andrew
"Viart has to be the most comprehensive shopping cart available. It has more features than you could ever want but sadly it's not all good.
All of the templates are table based and i mean table upon table. Users have repeatedly requested a css based template and yet it's not been provided. The support is the worst thing about these guys. I was really excited about dealing with them because im UK based as are they but after nearly two weeks of having a support ticket not responded to i had no choice but to request a refund. Ironically the refund was processed within a hour and they didn't even ask why i wanted the refund and still no response to the ticket. Another ticket i had open was regarding their menu system. On their demo site you choose which template to view and i liked how the menu displayed on one of them. However when i tried to use the same template the menu did not display as it did on their demo. Instead of their Support Techs resolving the issue they simply changed my site to use another template. When i stated that had i wanted to use that template i would have chosen it but instead i wanted the menu to display on the template as it did on their demo there was simply no response. I later found that their demo uses an older version of their software than is available which is why the menu wouldn't display as advertised.
All in all i can honestly say that there is nothing that compares to Viart by way of features but if you expect to be supported then look elsewhere because they would prefer to give you your money back than actually fix any issues or provide you with support!
A great shame."
Review date: November, 2008
Reviewed by: Musaaf
"Hello
Just having tested all of the php carts found here, whether paid or free. Viart comes at the top in terms of features and speed.
The most attractive feature is its CMS. Every page can be customized from the Admin panel and custom pages, custom blocks can be added into any page. They have just added Multi-Site Functionality and Wishlist feature, this is a great addition.
They keep on releasing new version frequently and provides quick bugs fixes. Though their forum system is lacking a bit but they have said that they would improve it in their next update.
"
Review date: April, 2008
Reviewed by: arkid
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Would almost give this excellent, its incredible value for money. My only complaints is the sometimes not too quick turn around on their email only support system and vitally the slightly amature testing some new releases seem to go through! They always patch releases and make everything stable eventually, but in the last month for example, a new revision of the program has gone through 7 sub revisions within a matter of weeks. whats worse, is that these were not made clearly visible on their website or informed to their customers via email in any way!
having said this, its got a huge number of features and once youve got to grips with its fully customisable template system you can use it to build an entire cms based website / blog type site that also has a shop built in."
Review date: March, 2008
Reviewed by: Riyaz
"I am in the process of researching for a shopping cart software, and I came across ViArt. Wow! everything I was looking for I found here.
I tested it on their site, mucking about with all kinds of different options and possibilities, everyday I learned something new and exciting.
Unlike others here, I got tremendous support from their staff, they were prompt, professional and their answers were accurate.
I have not yet purchased the product (March 08), only because I need to get the 2 tier Tax sorted out with this software. It can only handle 1 tax currently. I require 2 taxes and as separate entities.
The product for this price is unbeatable."
Review date: March, 2008
Reviewed by: Alexandro
"Personally I was greatly amused the way this soft works. It was easy to install and comprehend. The number of functions is simply impressive. But if something is lacked, the prog can be customized for a reasonable price.
By the way the program has great support. They answered my e-mail just in a few hours and made the customizing in another two days.
I have regrets of purchasing it.
"
Review date: March, 2008
Reviewed by: Bill
"I have a latest copy of viart 3.3, and it’s the definitive guide to understanding how it's important to make the product that has everything tied togather as one software bundle. I am qualified to make this judgment because (a) I’ve been trying to build a web-site using couple of other shopping carts (b) been a victim of these carts more than a few times.
To recognize if it’s a right cart for me I used one method. It goes like this: I put all my specifications into one list – send them to different carts support departments. As a result only viart has given me the really meaningful answer! When I got more questions I used their live support chat. The setup routine has gone smoothly, but then I was a bit stuck with products import – you need to play with that before you get it done. So currently I’m in the process of setting up the design – and I could say I enjoy the product – hope to go live soon. Keep up the great work.
"
Review date: February, 2008
Reviewed by: AjnabiZ
"This is an excellent cart. It is really fast and has tons of features.
It is very easy to customize it.
they have released 3.2 "
Review date: September, 2007
Reviewed by: Roger
"In terms of features, I think there is no cart script that has so many. I really think it is the best around.
Prices: a best buy! No question asked!
Support...that is their weak point. More than 3 days for presale question, excuse me! Presale means jump the gun, answer right now. It is the door to sales. Forum is lousy, very lousy. I have seen much much better. Product is one thing, support is everything!"
Review date: July, 2007
Reviewed by: Charly
"Absolutely agree with Dan with small note that they already support stock tracking on options as well!
Actually till now I never see the cart which have so many different functionality as viart shop has and for such low price. Actually you can buy all shopping cart stuff for only $119! But if you like you can buy it for $299 with additional modules like HelpDesk, Manuals, Forum, Articles, etc...
Unbeatable price, unbelievable product, the best I ever seen!!!"
Review date: February, 2007
Reviewed by: John
"I was unable to install this cart as it requires the Zend Optimizer, which my ISP does not yet support. However, I did contact a current ViArt shop owner, who was pleased with the product."
Review date: March, 2006
Reviewed by: Dan
"In the past month I have installed demos of 14 different carts and tested online demos of a half dozen others. These have been PGP, ASP and .NET stores with prices ranging from free to US$995. There are some good ones (and bad!), but ViArt, by a wide margin, is the best value I've found. It is lacking in very few areas and pre-sales support has been incredible. This is a new product and I am fully confident that the few features they haven't addressed yet will be added in short order. But believe me, there are very few areas lacking. And it offers things that the others don't, at any price. These guys are good! The product options support is the most flexible I've seen although it doesn't yet support stock tracking on options. But I'll wager that it will be added soon. These guys listen to their customers!! They offer substantial reseller discounts and multiple site licenses. With HTML templates and CSS this cart is easy to customize and superb SEO tools (but no static HTML). The CMS portal is icing on the cake. It includes events, news, user polls, classified ads and more. The Enterprise version is a substantial upgrade and adds a support forum and trouble ticket system. But even the Enterprise edition costs less than many of the basic shopping carts from other vendors and includes a premium support package. Overall, a superior product with an inexpensive price tag. They really should charge a lot more. Get it quick before they come to their senses!"
Review date: March, 2006
Add your own review |
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Shopping Cart Reviews Comments
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This cart has a nice touch of including a content management system and helpdesk support system, making it a complete solution for most sites. Good support for payment processors (including support of Verisign, Paypal PDT/IPN/Pro, Authorize.net, 2Checkout, Worldpay, LinkPoint, YourPay payment systems and more). Free version available for download.
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| Supported operating systems |
Windows, Linux, Unix |
| Language |
PHP |
| Database |
MySQL |
| Source code |
Yes |
| Reseller discounts |
Yes |
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| Product limit |
No |
| Category limit |
No |
| Multi-language |
Yes |
| Gift certificates |
Yes |
| Loyalty program |
Yes |
| Email merchant on order |
Yes |
| Affiliates program |
Yes |
| Site search |
Yes |
| Search optimization tools |
Yes |
| Product reviews |
Yes |
| Newsletters |
Yes |
| Discount coupons |
Yes |
| Customer registrations |
Yes |
| Wish list |
Yes |
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| Shipping price range |
Yes |
| Shipping weight range |
Yes |
| UPS lookup |
Yes |
| USPS lookup |
Yes |
| Fedex lookup |
Yes |
| Canada Post lookup |
No |
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| Tax by state |
Yes |
| Tax by country |
Yes |
| PayPal |
Yes |
| Authorize.Net |
Yes |
| Verisign |
Yes |
| Worldpay |
Yes |
| Secure Trading |
Yes |
| Others |
Yes |
| Non credit card options |
Yes |
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| Customer forums |
Yes |
| Free support |
Yes |
| Paid support |
Yes |
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| Sales reports |
Yes |
| Search reports |
Yes |
| Low stock reports |
Yes |
| Inventory reports |
Yes |
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Last updated:
19 Mar 2009
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