Lots of the same errors lately.. any idea?

[compunerdy]

Over the last few days I started getting hundreds of the following error. Any idea where to start tracking this down?

8/22/2012 11:40:59 AM Error An error has occured at http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/Categ ... tegoryId=6 Request timed out.
8/22/2012 11:40:59 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted.
8/22/2012 11:36:41 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
8/22/2012 11:34:50 AM Error An error has occured at http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/Categ ... tegoryId=3 Request timed out.
8/22/2012 11:34:50 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted.
8/22/2012 11:34:25 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
8/22/2012 11:32:59 AM Error An error has occured at http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/Categ ... egoryId=33 Request timed out.
8/22/2012 11:32:59 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted.
8/22/2012 11:30:29 AM Error An error has occured at http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/Produ ... ductId=776 Request timed out.

[calvis]

Hi Tim,

I am seeing hundreds of the errors as well.

From my sample:

8/21/2012 11:34:03 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted.
8/21/2012 10:30:51 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted.
8/21/2012 8:45:43 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted.

[compunerdy]

I wonder if it is a change to the wa state website.

[calvis]

That would be my guess.

[compunerdy]

Here is the website page that has links to the code..

http://dor.wa.gov/Content/FindTaxesAndR ... tionBased/

[calvis]

Oh no Tim, look what happened!

8/23/2012 12:08:38 PM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax

A customer just down the street was able to successfully place an order without tax being applied to the shipping and product. This leaves us for an audit risk if decide not to pay the tax out of own pocket. We just might hand deliver the package to them and take his shipping amount and apply it to tax.

[calvis]

I've reported the problem to the WA DOR as I think it is an issue with their system.

[compunerdy]

Did they reply at all? I sent a E-mail and got no reply yet.

[calvis]

Nope, nothing on my end.

[compunerdy]

Tried calling in today

Lady on the phone "We do not have a automated lookup tool"

I explained to her that they do and she said she would get a website person to call me back..

[compunerdy]

got a call back today from someone..

Guy.. "We do not have a automated lookup tool"

Me.. "look at your website"

Guy.. "Oh, Let me call you back"

/sigh

[calvis]

Tim,

I have to admire your persistence in this matter.

We continue to have lots of errors as well.

[Logan Rhodehamel]

I didn't realize the problem here was so widespread. Let me do some investigation as well.

[Logan Rhodehamel]

The integration specification hasn't changed. I do think they are having some server trouble - it is failing to respond on occasion. One thing we did for this provider for AC Gold release was build in some retry logic due to the failures. It attempts up to 3 times to retrieve the tax rate before it gives up. That greatly reduces the chance of having an order come through without tax but it doesn't prevent it completely. I will find out if we can make similar changes for the AC707 provider.

[compunerdy]

Thanks for looking into it Logan

It can be hundreds a day and we do not have that many customers in Washington state. How many times is it set to connect to the server? I know it is definately not once per order like I would think.

[compunerdy]

Finally got a real IT person on the phone this morning. She is going to track down who runs this app and get some answers hopefully.

[calvis]

Thanks Tim,

I hope someone can help us.

I was just looking through my error log and a see a few errors message relating to this issue that are somewhat different. At least they provide a better clue.



Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax

Unable to connect to the remote server; A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond 198.105.130.222:80

[compunerdy]

Those are the errors I get once in awhile which definately show a server connection issue. These other errors are what I am getting constantly and I am not sure if it is a server issue or not but since we have not changed any code I figured it must be.

Logan, can you shed some light as to the specific error we are getting that I made in the first post? Is that for sure a error we would see if it is a Wa state server issue?

[Logan Rhodehamel]

Logan, can you shed some light as to the specific error we are getting that I made in the first post? Is that for sure a error we would see if it is a Wa state server issue?

Yes. Those are errors that I think are directly related to the service reliability. The null exception error occurs because we are expecting an xml response. The code is not set up to handle what happens when we get an invalid (invalid xml) response. The other errors indicate that sometimes the service is refusing connections.

We didn't have any troubles like this up until a month or two ago. Then I started noticing random failures in our automated test suite. I hope that the DOR can find a reason for the service failures and improve the situation because it's a valuable service.

[compunerdy]

For the most part I get these errors.. always in the pair shown.

Code: Select all

 9/12/2012 11:12:58 AM Error An error has occured at http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/Category.aspx?CategoryId=58 Request timed out. 
 9/12/2012 11:12:58 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Thread was being aborted. 

Mixed in with those I get this one but nowhere near as often.

Code: Select all

9/12/2012 10:26:57 AM Error Could not calculate with the configured tax provider: CommerceBuilder.Taxes.Providers.WATax.WATaxProvider, CommerceBuilder.WATax Object reference not set to an instance of an object. 

[compunerdy]

The IT guy who runs the lookup tool got ahold of me and I PM'd you his contact info Logan. He said to have you contact him so you guys can work out any issues. He did mention they made some changes back around May but I am not sure if we have had these issues that long or not.

[Logan Rhodehamel]

I've contated David. I'll report back when I have some more information about the issue.

[compunerdy]

Any news? In the last two days I received 603 errors.

[compunerdy]

Logan,

I called and talked to David and he said he did everything he could on his end and would need you to get in touch with him to troubleshoot it further. I am still getting hundreds of errors a day so it would be great to get it fixed.

[Logan Rhodehamel]

Understood. He asked for some information that I didn't have readily available. Our error messages aren't going to mean anything to him. I need to get the error message that the server is returning and provide it. That means trying to force the error on my side and capturing the server response.