Split Shipping?

[fright-rags]

My site sells t-shirts that we generally stock and ship within 1-2 days. However, we've been doing more pre-order limited editions where we take the order, then print the shirt and ship it. That increases the wait time to about 3-4 weeks for the order. This is usually not a problem with customers, as they understand the wait time and reason behind it.

However, it does become an issue when an order includes an item we stock and can ship right away, as well as a pre-order item. In the past, we've just shipped all the items together when the pre-order item is available. But since we are doing this more and more, I would like to have an option where the customer is able to receive his/her shirts that are in stock first, then just wait for the ones that are pre-order. We've experimented with this by taking the complete order and only partially shipping it, then shipping the pre-order items when they come in. But that is problematic because the customer pays for shipping once, and we pay twice. And even though that original payment for shipping is for all the shirts, two separate shipments cost more than one.

So, is there a way to tell Zen Cart that a particular item is pre-order, and when that item is in the cart with another regular item, it will split the shipping costs and allow the customer to select the shipping options for both shipments? Also, would there be a way to modify the order iteself (automatically) that will allow us to split up orders in the admin so they are set to a different status when the order is placed (say pre-order, instead of processing)?

[ksookma]

You'll probably need to use CEON's Advanced Shipper to do this.

[fright-rags]

Thanks for the info. However, I just scanned the list of features and it doesn't seem to offer what I'm looking for.

[ksookma]

It allows you to setup specific shipping rules per item, per category, per manufacturer etc. As for splitting the order, you would need to have the customer place 2 seperate orders.