Help With Built In Shipping Zones?

[RabbitInTheHeadlight]

Hi everyone.

As my nick suggests I am literally about as inexperienced at this as is possible.

Very long story short, my web designer has not set up EU and worldwide shipping, possibly this is normal, but I feel a little short changed.

I have admin access and need to change my shipping zones for the EU and worldwide.

All my products are priced based and not weight. All I want is 0 - 30kg price for the EU & WW, and a 30 - 50kg price for the EU & WW.

My problem is I also sell small items that have minimal shipping weight. If I applied the 0 - 30kg to the EU zone, will this apply the setting to the small items too?

My apologies if this sounds like Swaheli to most.

David

[schoolboy]

Hi David

Welcome to the forum, and may your experiences with zencart be enjoyable and profitable.

Setting up shipping STARTS with a full assessment of WHO will be doing your shipping. Unless you intend getting in your car to deliver all orders yourself, it's probable that you will be using a courier service, or the services of the national mail.

Only when you have a firm idea of how your shipper charges THEIR rates, can you reasonably set up your shipping, because THEIR rate structure will determine what shipping modules you may need, or even whether you may need to "customise" shipping modules to cater for the shippers' rate structures.

If you let us know WHO you will be using to do your shipping, and give a rough idea of HOW they set their rates, then we will be able to advise on how to set this up in your ZC installation.

[RabbitInTheHeadlight]

Hi, and thank you very much for your welcome and taking the time to reply.

I have done all the research for knowing how much I need to charge for shipping to the EU & certain WW countries. The courier I will be using charges the same for products that weigh 3kg (which is the minimum for one of my framed products) up to 30kg. It changes slightly from 30 - 50kg.

Unfortunately, I also offer a product that costs just 20p shipping per product (photos).

I think I can sort out the shipping issues for the items that will cost for example, £25 to send to the EU, but I am puzzled as to whether this will mean that it will also cost potential customers the same just to have a few photos sent too?

Thank you again for replying :)

David.

[schoolboy]

I trust your designer re-configured the language file "english.php" to reflect your weight unit as KG and not LBS ? If not, this needs to be done.

Anyway...

STEP ONE

Give ALL your products a weight value - even the photos. You add the WEIGHT of a product in the product ADD/EDIT screen. The input field is near the bottom of the screen.

Make sure to configure each product's weight correctly as KILOGRAMS - OR DECIMAL FRACTIONS THEREOF.

The photos are unlikely to each weigh more than 10 grams, so their value will be 0.01

Then, the same for the frames. I a frame weighs 3kg250gram, the value will be 3.25

Remember... you just insert the NUMERICAL value... no KG symbols...


STEP TWO

Install the ZONES SHIPPING MODULE if it is not already installed.


Here, you have THREE zone options available to you. (If you need more than three options for zones, you will have to make a small edit to zones.php module file.)

Your zones could be:

1. United Kingdom (ISO CODE = GB)

2. European Union (GET ALL APPROPRIATE ISO CODES)

3. Rest of World (GET ALL APPROPPRIATE SO CODES)


Now... as your HEAVY products only kick in at about 3KG, anything under 3KG can be assumed to be photographs only.

So, you can safely assume that if a consignment has a weight UNDER 3kg, it is an order for photographs ONLY.

If a consignment has a weight OVER 3KG, either the shopper has ordered several thousand photos... or more likely they have ordered a frame or two.

SO...

STEP THREE

In each of the zone shipping RATES fields (there are THREE of them, because you have THREE zones), you will add the rates data that governs the calculations.

Assuming your parameters for UK rates are:

UP TO 3KG, charge 20 pence
BETWEEN 3KG AND 30KG, charge ten pounds
OVER 30KG, charge 25 pounds


The FORMULA entered into the GB zones rates field will look like this:

3:0.2,30:10,200:25

The above says:

3:0.2 (Up to THREE KG, charge 20p - or 0.2 of a pound) - then a COMMA

30:10 (Up to THIRTY KG, charge ten pounds) - then a COMMA

200:25 (Up to TWO HUNDRED KG, charge 25 pounds)...

Why go up to TWO HUNDRED !!!

Well, it is unlikely anyone will ever order goods with this consignment weight, it allows for the rate to be correctly applied if a person orders several heavy frames.

NOW

For your EU ZONE and your WW ZONE, you just use the SAME formulas, changing the PRICE component to reflect the higher cost your courier will charge for these sones.

[RabbitInTheHeadlight]

Thank you so much for your time and effort in your reply. I really appreciate it. It is so refreshing to know there are helpful people like yourself out there willing to give up their time to assist the likes of myself.

I will get in touch with my designer and make sure he has re-configured to KG's, in the meantime I will start to plough through my products and give them a weight using your guidance.

Luckily I can copy to category for the photos but it'll have to be copy to products for the framed items.....more strong coffee and waking with the larks!! :)

edit: Just a thought, as I have already added shipping to the UK via price (.20p per photo £10.99 for everything..free over £65) will adding weights and shioping zones affect this?

Thank you so much once again.

David.

[RabbitInTheHeadlight]

STEP ONE

Give ALL your products a weight value - even the photos. You add the WEIGHT of a product in the product ADD/EDIT screen. The input field is near the bottom of the screen.

Make sure to configure each product's weight correctly as KILOGRAMS - OR DECIMAL FRACTIONS THEREOF.

I'm so sorry for sounding a complete baffoon but I think I may have been misled by my designer.

I was told to place the actual COST of the shipping in the "Products Shipping Weight" ie. £10.99 for the framed products & .20p for the photos. Is this where I should be placing the actual WEIGHT of each product ie. 3.25 (for 3kg 250g)?

If it is I am straight and I can change it all, and I can add the EU & WW zones, just a little confused until then.

David.

[schoolboy]

Hmmmm....

Your "designer" seems to be the one who's a buffoon.

The weight field in the PRODUCT ADD/EDIT screen is NOT a way of simply advertising the shipping rate. It is PART of a variable used in calculating the shipping cost.

If the incorrect information is inserted into this field, your webshop will not be able to calculate the cost of shipping.

It looks like your "designer" has tried to configure a whole host of cumbersome work-arounds for your shipping costing system, and these will simply not work. Clean ALL of it put, and do it properly. DO NOT put monetary values into the weight field. DO NOT then try to inclide shipping rates into prices.

1. Put the WEIGHT of the item into the WEIGHT field, as it was designed to do.
2. Price your goods properly. Do not include shipping prices in the product price.

3. From my earlier post, configure the ZONE shipping module to calculate your shipping rates.

Perhaps you need to fire your "designer" - (I most certainly would! )

You should take a look at this posting by Linda McGrath. She is explaining something specific for another forum user, but the principle of what she says applies to you too.

[RabbitInTheHeadlight]

Schoolboy, I'd like to thank you very much for your replies.

At the moment I feel let down by my designer due to the fact that some of the products I sell are, by my own admission, over priced for shipping, and some are underpriced due to the way he has got me to configure the shipping prices. Although it is unlikely, as I am a very new business, I am also left wide open for a potential customer from across the other side of the world ordering a product and getting the same shipping rate as a customer ordering from the next street to me therefore creating a situation where I will be paying them to buy from me!

Just to be crystal, and to avoid further embarrassment here, may I message you just to be completely clear on what I need to do? I promise it will only be once.

Thank you again.

Regards.

David.

[schoolboy]

Here are the ISO 2-character COUNTRY CODES for countries in the EU (excepting the United Kingdom, because you put GB into its own zone).

Official name in English THEN Country code (2)

Belgium BE
Republic of Bulgaria BG
Czech Republic CZ
Kingdom of Denmark DK
Federal Republic of Germany DE
Republic of Estonia EE
Ireland IE
Greece GR
Kingdom of Spain ES
French Republic FR
Italian Republic IT
Republic of Cyprus CY
Republic of Latvia LV
Republic of Lithuania LT
Grand Duchy of Luxembourg LU
Hungary HU
Republic of Malta MT
Kingdom of the Netherlands NL
Republic of Austria AT
Republic of Poland PL
Portuguese Republic PT
Romania RO
Republic of Slovenia SI
Slovak Republic SK
Finland FI
Kingdom of Sweden SE

(HERE'S THE UK'S ISO CODE)
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland GB


This is what you type into the zone for European Union Countries
BE,BG,CZ,DK,DE,EE,IE,GR,ES,FR,IT,CY,LV,LT,LU,HU,MT,NL,AT,PL,PT,RO,SI,SK,FI,SE

Then you apply whatever RATES you are charging for that zone: (FOR EXAMPLE):
3:0.5,30:20,200:50

The above says:

3:0.5 (Up to THREE KG, charge 50p - or 0.5 of a pound) - then a COMMA

30:20 (Up to THIRTY KG, charge twenty pounds) - then a COMMA

200:50 (Up to TWO HUNDRED KG, charge fifty pounds)...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

For United Kingdom, the zone has only ONE ISO CODE:
GB
Then you apply whatever RATES you are charging for the GB zone: (FOR EXAMPLE):
3:0.2,30:10,200:25

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Your THIRD zone is REST OF WORLD, so you put in the country codes of all the countries you wish to ship to. (Be cautious here... you may not want to sell to ALL countries - there are some big risks with selling to some basket-case countries.)

For ISO CODES... Go HERE

[schoolboy]

You will also need to adjust TARE and GROSS shipping variables.

ADMIN >>> CONFIGURATION >>> SHIPPING.