I've been reading through the forums, and I've found posts that come
close to matching my case, but then everyone's is different, right?

Of course I'm mimicking the client's current pricing structure with ZC.
I know how to set up the product pricing already. What I need to
figure out is the [FONT="Times New Roman"]mixed shipping requirement[/FONT]. Here's a short but thorough
summary of what they're doing.

I have master (highest level) categories A, B, and C.

Under category A are sub categories A1, and A2.
Under category B are sub categories B1, and B2.
Under category C are sub categories C1, and C2.
All subcategories contain multiple product items.

Pricing for A1, A2 items is discount by quantity per item.
Pricing for B1, B2 items is constant per item regardless of quantity.
Pricing for C1, C2 items is discount by quantity per item.

Here's where the model gets squirrely.

  • Shipping for A1, A2, B1, B2 items (not including C1, C2)
    is table based, by gross price.
  • Shipping for C1 and C2 (not including A1, A2, B1, nor B2)
    is discounted by individual quantity, and although the quantity
    breaks for shipping are identical for both C1 and C2 right now,
    they may be different in the future.

So no, they're not calculating shipping based on weight,
they've approximated the shipping costs closely enough to use
this [FONT="Times New Roman"]mixed item and table format[/FONT], and they want to stick with it.

If the solution is to go to commercial help, is that suggesting a
forum called [FONT="Times New Roman"]Commercial Help[/FONT], or would that mean finding a
contract PHP programmer out there somewhere? Thanks in
advance for your input.

It's not a matter of displaying or hiding different shipping options
in the checkout, instead I need to have the shipping calculated as
an ongoing process as the client is shopping, and present the
shipping amount at the end of the process.

Tax on A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2 is on gross price less shipping, and only
if shipped to AL or TX. If shipped to other than AL or TX then there's
no tax charged. I don't have a problem figuring this out, in fact the tax
portion is working just fine. Now if I can get a way to add all product
costs and shipping costs separately, I'll calculate tax on the product
cost and be finished.

Am I a programmer? Sort of. With some handholding I might be able
to code PHP.

Doug Parker
Orlando FL
USA