Profiles

Cardigan uses a concept called "Profiles" to define which external provider to connect with, the API credentials to use when doing so, and how Cardigan should behave for the operations that run through that provider.

You can create as many profiles per store as you need. One of them is nominated as your default profile, which is the profile Cardigan uses for gift card operations unless something more specific applies.

This means you can keep a profile pointing at your provider's staging credentials while you're getting set up, then create a separate production profile and make it the default when you're ready to go live.

Profile types

Every profile has a type, which decides what it's used for:

• Gift card - issuing, checking and redeeming gift cards. This is the type most stores use, and the one the rest of this documentation assumes unless it says otherwise.
• Wallet - synchronising an external customer wallet with Shopify's native store credit. See Wallets.

A store can run profiles of both types at the same time. They're independent of each other: each type has its own default profile, and adding a wallet profile changes nothing about how your gift cards behave.

A profile's type follows from the provider you choose, so there's nothing to set - picking a wallet provider creates a wallet profile.

Creating a profile

From the Cardigan dashboard inside the Shopify admin, select "Profiles" from the left-hand side menu.

Click "Add new profile", select the provider you want to create a profile for, and then "Add profile".

You'll be able to give your profile a name (this is just used internally for your reference), and enter the API credentials supplied by your gift card provider.

Testing credentials

It's a good idea to test your API credentials before saving, just to make sure everything's working - you can do that by clicking "Test credentials" after entering your details.

Once you've run a successful credential test, click "Save" and your profile will be created.

Setting a default profile

A newly created profile isn't used for anything until you make it your default. This prevents a half-configured profile being used by customers before you're ready.

To set a default, open the profile by clicking on it in the "Profiles" list, then choose "Set profile as default" at the bottom of the page and confirm.

Any profile that was previously the default is replaced, and gift card functionality immediately begins using the new one.

Deleting a profile

If you want to remove a profile entirely, open it and click "Delete profile" at the bottom of the page.

Deleting a profile can't be undone, so in most cases you'll want to simply set a different profile as your default instead. The records of cards already issued and redeemed through a deleted profile are retained.

Checking a card against a profile

The profile detail view includes a balance check tool, which performs a live balance lookup against that specific profile's credentials.

This is useful when you want to confirm a profile is working correctly, or to check a card against a staging profile without affecting your live setup. See Balance check for more on looking up cards from the admin.

Configuration options

In addition to the profile name and the credentials used to connect to your provider, each profile exposes configuration options specific to the provider in use. These are documented on each provider's own page - see the Providers section.

Which options are available depends on your provider and your external account setup, so the provider page is always the place to look when deciding how to configure a profile.

Using more than one profile at once

Most stores only need a single default profile.

If your business uses different provider accounts for different regions, currencies or sales channels, Cardigan can route each transaction to the appropriate profile automatically - see Profile routing.