Royal Mail Basic UK Shipping Modules

Am I allowed to say 'ek weet nie?' :)

Are you getting this in admin modules without the module installed?
Yep, so do I on some machines and with certain versions of Zen Cart, PHP, phases of the moon etc etc, and I must confess I've never been able to work out why.
My 'solution' has been to delete the module 'Parcelforece48b' if I'm not going to be using it, or install it if I am. I seem to remember that clears the message? Not very elegant I know, but if you have a new twist on it, maybe we can find the bug.

Rgds,

Chuck

Chuckl:

Am I allowed to say 'ek weet nie?' :)

Chuck

Hoe weet u dat ek oorspronklik 'n Suid Afrikaner is?

You past comments about working in CT and UK, plus 'ryk' is a dead give-away to us Durbs types?

Chuckl:

You past comments about working in CT and UK, plus 'ryk' is a dead give-away to us Durbs types?

I am in London most of the time now - though still have a house in CT (Gardens, under the mountain). Lived in SA for 40 years before coming to UK "permanently" in 2002.

My colleague, Fairestcape, spends more time in CT.

Yes, I might be mixing the two of you up a bit. I did correspond with him some years back on some stuff he was doing in CT. Equally I was staying just outside Baldock at the time, so just down the road from you.

Ha... Baldock... I was Head of Marketing at Capita for a while and used to drive through Baldock every day on my way to Bedford. What a commute that was... 2 hours each way, every day...

Distances in CT are MUCH more reasonable !

Hi!

Does this plugin come with the new royal mail prices of april 2012 or do they have to be added manually?

Thx

New rates will need to be inserted. It's a tedious job, but RM are not known for simplicity.

JUST load the RM/Parcelforce components you need.

One small issue I have with this mod in it current form, is that it generates single-line input boxes for the rates data, rather than text area fields.

I am going to modify it to generate better input boxes and MIGHT (if I have time), insert the new RM rates.

Don't hold your breath. I am very busy.

Thx for the info fairestcape.

Having the rates already installed would be fab as getting them from Royal Mail, as you mentioned, is really a struggle.
I think I'll try to install it anyway just to test how it works and track this thread for any updates reagrding rates.

The mods work well, and getting the new rates into the system is straight-forward but time-consuming. The rates are inserted in the conventional ZC manner (eg: 0.1:0.95 = up to 0,1kg, charge 95p).

There are TABLES of rates on RM and parcelforce websites, but you have to do some hard digging to find them. Again... RM does not like to make things easy for people...

Cool!

I'll give it a go and see how I get on although I know from experience its going to be a bit of a trawl with RM.

Cheers
Brinley

Hi Welshop, for some reason I didn't get any alerts about you post. A couple of things to bear in mind -

RM in their updates always seem to fiddle the numbers so that prices are difficult to compare to the previous year, the updates usually make a fundamental change somewhere,
As I understand it, the new prices for 'Personal' come into effect on 30th April,
This year those fundamental changes are on the Standard Parcels extra insurance, as it now depends on the weight as well as the value. As a result the numbers cannot just be plugged into the existing code. I'm looking at it as time permits

Rgds,

Hi Chuckl

I dont entirely understand what you mean with regards to why the exisiting numbers cant be plugged into the existing code.

I think I need to do a test install tonight to get an idea of the plugin and its functionality so that I am up to speed on how it works - thats way I think I'll have a better understanding of what you are saying.

Cheers
Brinley

Ok! I have had a read of the documentation and things are clearer now.
The one things I would like to clarify is the mention that if a customer is UK based it will only show UK shipping and the same for international.
So does that mean that a UK customer cannot buy something and have it delivered to a person in another country?

Cheers
Brinley

welshop.com:

I dont entirely understand what you mean with regards to why the exisiting numbers cant be plugged into the existing code.

The code has been written to base insurance value ONLY on consignment value.

Now RM in their infinite wisdom are going to calculate insurance based on consignment value AND weight.

In order for the module to factor in this mixed set of variables, the code has to be re-written to accommodate the mixed variables.

Thanks schoolboy, excellent summary. It's not a huge effort to get the parcels module updated, it's just that this happens every year, without fail. There is also the gotcha that for certain services the service is zero VAT, unless you add tracking or insurance, at which point the whole thing is VAT rated. But, I'll get it changed by the end of the month....

Welshop, the module was designed to be as easy to install and use as possible. That said, it's very versatile, and will happily handle the situation you described. Install and enable your required modules, and then go to your shop and add an item to the cart. Then, estimate shipping, and change the destination country in the popup.

Thx 2 U both

Its starting to make sense now and so I'll get it installed and run some tests. No doubt I will have to ask a few more questions but looking good so far.

Cheers
Brinley

Royal Mail's 30th April 2012 changes appear to be splitting Airmail Worldwide prices into 2 zones and charging two different prices for each.

Have I missed reading something somewhere, but Im concerned that none of the software seems to have been changed to reflect this.

Probably because it's not the 30th April yet? :)

Yes, I'm aware of that one toyseller, they're splitting the 'Rest of World' into 2 zones. That one is addressable as the new rates are available, and adding a Zone is well invented.
At the moment, I'm trying to establish what the new insurance rates will be for Standard parcels. The RM 'Our Prices' brochure no longer lists them, and the website only has the current rates, as far as I can see.

I experienced an interesting situation with these RM add-ons. When the items in thev cart are ALL free shipping, it does not disable the module(s).

ORIGINAL CODE (Example from RM First Class Recorded)

class rmfirstrec {
    var $code, $title, $description, $enabled, $num_zones;

    // class constructor
    function rmfirstrec() {

        global $order, $total_weight;

        $this->version = '2.2.2';
        $this->code = 'rmfirstrec';
        $this->title = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_TEXT_TITLE . ' v' . $this->version;
        $this->description = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_TEXT_DESCRIPTION . ' v' . $this->version;
        $this->sort_order = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_SORT_ORDER;
        $this->icon = ( defined('DIR_WS_ICONS') ? DIR_WS_ICONS : 'images/icons/' ) .  'shipping_rmukrec.gif'; // upload icon to catalog/images/icon directory
        $this->tax_class = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_TAX_CLASS;
        $this->enabled = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_STATUS == 'True') ? true : false);
        $this->num_zones = 1;
        $this->weight_split = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_WEIGHT_SPLIT == 'True') ? true : false);
        $this->value_split = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_VALUE_SPLIT == 'True') ? true : false);

MY CHANGES (seem to fix this).

class rmfirstrec {
    var $code, $title, $description, $enabled, $num_zones;

    // class constructor
    function rmfirstrec() {

        global $order, $total_weight;

        $this->version = '2.2.2';
        $this->code = 'rmfirstrec';
        $this->title = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_TEXT_TITLE . ' v' . $this->version;
        $this->description = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_TEXT_DESCRIPTION . ' v' . $this->version;
        $this->sort_order = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_SORT_ORDER;
        $this->icon = ( defined('DIR_WS_ICONS') ? DIR_WS_ICONS : 'images/icons/' ) .  'shipping_rmukrec.gif'; // upload icon to catalog/images/icon directory
        $this->tax_class = MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_TAX_CLASS;
        //$this->enabled = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_STATUS == 'True') ? true : false);
        $this->num_zones = 1;
        $this->weight_split = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_WEIGHT_SPLIT == 'True') ? true : false);
        $this->value_split = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_VALUE_SPLIT == 'True') ? true : false);

// disable only when entire cart is free shipping
        if (zen_get_shipping_enabled($this->code)) {
        $this->enabled = ((MODULE_SHIPPING_RMFIRSTREC_STATUS == 'True') ? true : false);
        }