Stamps.com integration - Couple small bugs need addressing

[roberttimmons]

Does the fact that

today is 10/28/2010 and Stamps.com is checking for orders on 10/29/2010 have anything to do with any problem?

Last week, a Stamps.com supervisor called me but apologized that he could not help with any problems because the Technical Supervisors declined to participate in a phone call for a technical issue.

hey Rix.. I have noticed when all else fails just delete the web profile on the stamps.com and re create it.. kind of a hassle but its fixed us a few times. Make sure to save that access token or you will be digging for it..

[RixStix]

Hi RixStix,

Where are you finding that date? In the XML? If it's doing that, it certainly is a problem. What time of day did you see that happen?

Bill

There were quite a few individual hits for tomorrow in the string of the 6-8 dozen Stamps.com "Who's Online" listings that occurs every couple of hours and are probably in the server logs that I am too lazy to dig through.

[StampsCom]

Hello,

I wanted to reach out to everyone and let you all know that we are still working on these issues. Here are some quick updates:

Import Shipping Methods: We're working to put together more detailed instructions on how these can be imported. As soon as I have more details, I'll be sure to post.

Emails: We're investigating the feasibility of having Stamps.com initiate the emails sent through Zen Cart. With a number of our other shopping cart integrations, we do support similar features. We'd like to get this working with Zen Cart if possible. At this time, I don't have any additional details, although we're researching the issue. In the meantime, we do support a feature that allows you to use Stamps.com to send a shipping confirmation email directly to your customers.

As for the other errors/feature requests that have been mentioned, we are looking into these as well. Thanks to everyone for your patience as we work to make this integration better for the Zen Cart community.

If anyone has any additional questions/complaints/requests, please let us know; we take your comments very seriously and we are committed to improving this integration.

Thanks!
Chuck
Stamps.com

[roberttimmons]

bump for updates

[StampsCom]

Hello,

Sorry for the delay on resolving these issues; we are still working to investigate/resolve these issues.

The one issue I do have an update on is the automated process for notification emails. After investigating the requested functionality, we feel that this is a feature outside of the scope of the Stamps.com integration. Stamps.com's solution is designed to allow Zen Cart merchants to import orders from Zen Cart and process USPS shipping labels for these orders. After processing shipping labels, Stamps.com posts back information to Zen Cart to confirm shipment.

As a feature for our customers, Stamps.com offers the ability to send email confirmations directly from Stamps.com. As some have mentioned, this is not an ideal solution. To improve this, we will soon be offering additional levels of customization to the emails we send.

As for the other issues, we are currently investigating these. Most notably, we are working to fix the ship method importing as fast as we can.

Thanks!
Chuck
Stamps.com

[roberttimmons]

Hello,

Sorry for the delay on resolving these issues; we are still working to investigate/resolve these issues.

The one issue I do have an update on is the automated process for notification emails. After investigating the requested functionality, we feel that this is a feature outside of the scope of the Stamps.com integration. Stamps.com's solution is designed to allow Zen Cart merchants to import orders from Zen Cart and process USPS shipping labels for these orders. After processing shipping labels, Stamps.com posts back information to Zen Cart to confirm shipment.

As a feature for our customers, Stamps.com offers the ability to send email confirmations directly from Stamps.com. As some have mentioned, this is not an ideal solution. To improve this, we will soon be offering additional levels of customization to the emails we send.

As for the other issues, we are currently investigating these. Most notably, we are working to fix the ship method importing as fast as we can.

Thanks!
Chuck
Stamps.com

You are aware that this forum is full of software programmers right? The reason we choose this software for our web stores is simple. There is nothing that is outside the scope of possibility. Its fully customizable to do anything with the proper code.

I'm sure we all understand stamps.com reasoning for this update to be ignored. Its simple. You want our customers to get emails from stamps.com to increase customer awareness and branding for the stamps.com software. So basically if we want our customers automatically notified we have to allow you to spam our customers with your advertising.. Which you do with every single notification email you sent out..

This is what is in the footer of every single email you send to OUR customers..

The shipment information contained in this email is provided by Stamps.com.
For questions about this package, please contact the sender of
the package or the U.S. Postal Service.

============================================================================
Print official USPS postage from your own printer with Stamps.com,
and eliminate trips to the Post Office forever!
Sign up at http://www.stamps.com/freeoffer and receive our special
introductory offer. Try it risk free today!
============================================================================



This is an unacceptable practice in my opinion. Aol.com got in trouble for doing the exact same. Spamming emails with a footer to free email customers. They certaintly dont do it anymore.

And by the way. its very possible to invoke the zc notification system to email the customers.

I made it happen and here is a screen shot- please note this is not with the stamps.com module but another that auto posted to the customer order detail and notified the customer..
Simple flag under customer notify
-1 hide from customer
0 post to order but do not notify customer
1 post to order and notify customer.

[StampsCom]

Hi Robert,

I am sorry for any frustration that I may have caused. It is certainly not our intention to block merchants from emailing from within Zen Cart as opposed to Stamps.com.

I understand your frustrations with our email system and I will pass on your comments about the included email ad to management. Please note that this email notification feature is simply an option for our customers to use and is not something that is required.

Thanks,
Chuck
Stamps.com

[RixStix]

Robert,

If you look at the almost daily updates to the Stamps.com ecommerce package, you'll see that nearly all changes are to the Magento files and very few changes to the zen-cart files which shows where the programming resources are being directed.

I don't have a problem with the Stamps.com email notices vs from within Zen-cart. I do have issue with Stamps.com was SPAMMING our customers with their adverts. I had assumed that the notices were clones of the USPS notifications.

[nohart]

Just beware that the communication with the application once installed on your computer with your store is horrible. Once you have an order placed it can take several hours for the order to be imported into the stamps.com application so you can print the shipping label!

There is absolutely no excuse for this and I have called several times about this and every time they give me the same answer that it may take up to 2 hours for the order to be imported into your application. I told them there is absolutely no reason why this shouldn't be real time and their basic attitude is oh well we are sorry.

I have told them that it is very important for me to give my customers timely service and they obviously could care less because this has been going on for over 6 months.

[StampsCom]

nohart,

I've passed your concerns to management regarding faster import times. Currently, this delay is due to technical limitations of how the import works. We recognize the preference to cut the delay down to allow for real time imports and hope to decrease this delay as much as possible in a future release.

Thanks!
Chuck
Stamps.com