AUSTPost module

Hey Rod

Here is the Error message I get, I re-read your post regarding just allowing the satchel options so once again I disabled EVERYTHING except the Satchels (Reg and Express) go to checkout shipping estimator and gett the following error message:

ERROR:Unable to obtain a valid quote from the Australia Post Server.
You may still checkout using this method and we will contact you with postage costs as soon as possible.

Go back to the Shipping module options enable Regular Parcels click apply go to check out click estimate shipping and it estimates the cost of shipping (farther away the post code the more expensive). So what I have found out is that Regular Parcel MUST be enabled to get any type of shipping estimate for the customer...

I will continue to experiment but so far everything I have tried does not work mate

thanks for your patience

OK

Some progress when I change the dimesnsion of the product with only the satchels enabled it displays the two options but does not include the price!

Hi,

I've been reading up on Austpost, and in installing it, I've managed to get myself the following error (at the point of uploading the auspost.sql file):

1067 Invalid default value for 'date_added'
in:
[CREATE TABLE geo_zones ( geo_zone_id int(11) NOT NULL auto_increment, geo_zone_name varchar(32) NOT NULL default '', geo_zone_description varchar(255) NOT NULL default '', last_modified datetime default NULL, date_added datetime NOT NULL default '', PRIMARY KEY (geo_zone_id) ) TYPE=MyISAM;]
If you were entering information, press the BACK button in your browser and re-check the information you had entered to be sure you left no blank fields.

There was a solution that someone found regarding dumping a database, however I am extremely new to this and have no idea how to do so - and if I tried I would probably muck something important up. Any help would be much appreciated!

Michael

This is really strange I have been working on it for ages!

Basically No matter what I do it wont caclulate the postage cost if there is a quanity more then 1 of a product. If I have one product in the Cart and click estimate shipping it says 0.00 for both Regular and Express.

The only way I can make it work is if I add the handling fees to be 5.50 and 7.90 respectfully but this fails if a customer puts the quanity for a single product to more than one then it gives me the above error about not being able to connect to the server.

My Current settings are:

(IN GRAMS)
Enter the Maximum Package Weight you will ship 500
Package Tare Small to Medium - added percentage:weight 0.0
Larger packages - added packaging percentage:weight 0:0

0.0 Because the satchels weigh nothing really.

AND

Default Parcel Dimensions
21,12,4.8

Which is pretty much the most common sized product I sell....

Thoughts?

mirage:

Hi,

I've been reading up on Austpost, and in installing it, I've managed to get myself the following error (at the point of uploading the auspost.sql file):

1067 Invalid default value for 'date_added'
in:
[CREATE TABLE geo_zones ( geo_zone_id int(11) NOT NULL auto_increment, geo_zone_name varchar(32) NOT NULL default '', geo_zone_description varchar(255) NOT NULL default '', last_modified datetime default NULL, date_added datetime NOT NULL default '', PRIMARY KEY (geo_zone_id) ) TYPE=MyISAM;]
If you were entering information, press the BACK button in your browser and re-check the information you had entered to be sure you left no blank fields.

There was a solution that someone found regarding dumping a database, however I am extremely new to this and have no idea how to do so - and if I tried I would probably muck something important up. Any help would be much appreciated!

Michael

I suggest you revert your system back to the same state that it was before you tried this install, and then download and install the "Austpost Improved" module instead.

I can't offer any support for the module you have downloaded, but can give you lots of help (if you need it) with the Improved version. They are totally different modules.

Although both modules are compatible with each other (meaning that you can install both at the same time) it will tend to get a wee bit confusing for both yourself and your customers (which is also why I suggest you remove the original before installing the new).

Tip. Before installing any useful modules (such as the shipping estimators) I strongly suggest you play around with a few different templates to customise the look of your store.
The reason being is that the template you finally decide upon will determine where you need to place some of the files from other modules. IOW, if you install the Austpost shipping estimator (and many other modules) first, and THEN decide to use a different template you'll need to either re-install or relocate everything you've already done.

Cheers
Rod.

Thankyou very much for that, I shall give it a go, and choose a template before i go fiddling around with the modules. I was under the impression that I had the improved Austpost, but evidently this is not so - thankyou also for enlightening me to that fact!

Michael

Webmyster:

This is really strange I have been working on it for ages!

Thoughts?

Yes, many. <g>

Webmyster:

Basically No matter what I do it wont caclulate the postage cost if there is a quanity more then 1 of a product.

Methinks that could be a clue. Don't you?

Webmyster:

If I have one product in the Cart and click estimate shipping it says 0.00 for both Regular and Express.

Hang on there.... this is a fault finding exersize. It works like this.. There are MANY reasons that could cause unexpected and inexplicable errors. I've heard them all and explained them all. One thing I don't do is guess.

You have just given me cause to guess, which means I can't really trust anything you have said and as such we may need to start all over again. <big sigh>

Which is the correct statement:
"it wont caclulate the postage cost if there is a quanity more then 1".
Or
"If I have one product in the Cart and click estimate shipping it says 0.00"

If the first comment is true, then I'd be assuming that a quantity of one DOES give a quote", yet your second comment suggests that it isn't returning a quote even for one product.

Webmyster:

The only way I can make it work is if I add the handling fees to be 5.50 and 7.90

Let me guess, this then gives you a 'quote' of 5.50 and 7.90 respectively?

As I said, we need to consider going back to square one, because this hardly constitutes as 'working'.

Webmyster:

respectfully but this fails if a customer puts the quanity for a single product to more than one then it gives me the above error about not being able to connect to the server.

I win my bet. Twice.
PLEASE RE-READ THE ERROR MESSAGE, it says "
ERROR:Unable to obtain a valid quote from the Australia Post Server."

Where does this message even suggest that it is unable to connect to the server?

Sorry to have to make you think about this, but if someone asked you to give them a quote on how much it will cost you to send them a parcel weighing 50kgs via Australia Post, what would you do?
I'd assume that like most people you will contact Australia Post (if you didn't know any better) in some way (web, phone, counter, whatever), and you would find out that their regular services only cater up to 20kgs. Fine, you can get a quote elsewhere using a different service, but what will you tell your customer.. Will you state that you couldn't contact Australia Post for a quote and have therefore provided a quote from a different courier, or will you tell them that the Parcel is too heavy for Australia Post and therefore has to go via a different carrier?

Give them the bs line about not being able to contact Australia Post and they are quite likely to ask you to recheck later when you can contact them. A pointless excersize.

My point being, we are looking for clues. I hate going around in circles due to guesswork and assumptions.

When you state "can't connect to server" I start thinking about connectivity issues, cURL, proxies, redirections, etc.

When the error message is "can't get a VALID quote from server" that may be a connectivity issue, but generally isn't.

Webmyster:

My Current settings are:

(IN GRAMS)
Enter the Maximum Package Weight you will ship 500

For 90 points out of a hundred, tell me what you think this setting does?

Webmyster:

Package Tare Small to Medium - added percentage:weight 0.0
Larger packages - added packaging percentage:weight 0:0

0.0 Because the satchels weigh nothing really.
Well, no not really. Satchels to weigh something, even if only a few grams. It may not be significant but I'll always maintain that tare weights should always be a consideration.

I'm pretty sure the AP module vets for all possible problems caused be zero value weights, but it is quite surprising where "division by zero" errors can pop up in a program.

This however is probably a non issue in regards to your problem (better to use zeros than it is to add several kilos to a package weight).

Webmyster:

AND

Default Parcel Dimensions
21,12,4.8
Which is pretty much the most common sized product I sell....

And well within the size limits.

Webmyster:

Here is the Error message I get, I re-read your post regarding just allowing the satchel options so once again I disabled EVERYTHING except the Satchels (Reg and Express) go to checkout shipping estimator and gett the following error message:

ERROR:Unable to obtain a valid quote from the Australia Post Server.

Thoughts?

I was originally thinking you had a dimensional problem, but it appears that this may no longer be the case based on the information currently provided.

Information you haven't provided, is the weight(s) of the products you are testing with, and most importantly (if my current suspicion is wrong and the 'penny doesn't drop') I'll need a URL to one of the products in your store that you are testing with.
I ask for a specific product, 'cos if you have 100 items in your store and 99 of them exhibit a problem I am sure to pick the only non problematic one when I test.

Anyway sorry about the rave. Based on a couple of positive facts, and one or two assumptions, I think I know what is wrong, or at least a contributing factor, and the answer lies in the question:

"For 90 points out of a hundred, tell me what you think this setting does? (Maximum Package Weight you will ship)

Cheers
Rod

Webmyster:

Hey Rod

Here is the Error message I get, I re-read your post regarding just allowing the satchel options so once again I disabled EVERYTHING except the Satchels (Reg and Express) go to checkout shipping estimator and gett the following error message:

ERROR:Unable to obtain a valid quote from the Australia Post Server.
You may still checkout using this method and we will contact you with postage costs as soon as possible.

Go back to the Shipping module options enable Regular Parcels click apply go to check out click estimate shipping and it estimates the cost of shipping (farther away the post code the more expensive). So what I have found out is that Regular Parcel MUST be enabled to get any type of shipping estimate for the customer...

I will continue to experiment but so far everything I have tried does not work mate

thanks for your patience

Funnily enough, after reading this message I am now back to thinking you have a dimensional issue (did you change your default parcel dimensions between emails?).

I'm not trying to be vague or anything, but what you have described here is what would occur if the products dimensions are too large for a prepaid satchel.

If only the satchels are enabled, and the products are considered too large or heavy, the module will return 'unable to get valid quote' because the only other probable valid option is regular parcel post, which had been disabled.

You can (apparently) get a quote with parcels, so this confirms that you don't seem to have any issues connecting to the server.

Not sure where this leads in regards to the problem of not being able to get a quote for more than one item. The issues may or may not be related. It depends what you changed and what your test products are.

Cheers
Rod.

Hehe RodG your posts humour me (not a bad thing!) :D

Regarding the question ""For 90 points out of a hundred, tell me what you think this setting does? (Maximum Package Weight you will ship)" I assume this setting is the maximum weight I will ship per customer. I added 500 grams because I only use 500 gram satchels so basically whenever the customer adds more then 500 grams it has two or more boxes.

When I disable everything else and leave Regular Parcel option ticked everything works wonderfuly it calculates ######## shipping correctly regardless of how many products I add so I am very happy. Regular Parcel works very well with my new settings and dimensions which I posted before.

So Regular Parcel setting works a charm wont bother trying to fix that Satchel option too much time spent on it already thanks again RodG it looks like I am out of your hair! :D

I feel LUCKY for finding this post~!:D It seems great!

I am using ZEN CART 1.38 version, which AUSTPost module I should download for my site? Is it able to calculate the international shipping cost and how to set it to get a more actual result? Do I have to install another module to compliance this with cost estimate or this module does it all?:wink:

Many thanks~!

Webmyster:

Hehe RodG your posts humour me (not a bad thing!) :D

Regarding the question ""For 90 points out of a hundred, tell me what you think this setting does? (Maximum Package Weight you will ship)" I assume this setting is the maximum weight I will ship per customer.

Bummer. You score zilch. From the config option itself, it states
"Carriers have a max weight limit for a single package" . (not per customer).

Webmyster:

I added 500 grams because I only use 500 gram satchels so basically whenever the customer adds more then 500 grams it has two or more boxes.

The theory seems sound, but what happens if any single item in your store weighs more than 500gm, if if the dimensions happen to be too large? You haven't left yourself any fallback method.

Also, by setting this as a global limit you are actually defeating all of the 'brain power' of the AP module itself, and you will probably be better off using a price per item shipping method (after all, that is effectively what you seem to be aiming for).

Nonetherless, this still has me curious in regards to explaining the results you are getting with the AP module.
I do believe you have stumbled across a rather unique set of configurations that allows things to 'fall through the gaps'.

Webmyster:

When I disable everything else and leave Regular Parcel option ticked everything works wonderfuly it calculates ######## shipping correctly regardless of how many products I add so I am very happy. Regular Parcel works very well with my new settings and dimensions which I posted before.

So Regular Parcel setting works a charm wont bother trying to fix that Satchel option too much time spent on it already thanks again RodG it looks like I am out of your hair! :D

Please don't bow out on me now... There is a solution to this odd behaviour, but I/we need to work out the cause of it first.
I do this by typing out my thought processes in these replys. :-)

The fact that Regular parcels 'works a charm' eliminates a lot of possible causes.

What makes the difference between a regular parcel and a prepaid satchel (from the perspective of the AP module)?

Simple answer... weights and/or dimensions.

You have already indicated that the parcel dimensions are within the limits of a 500gm satchel, so that now only leaves one possible place left ... weights.

As mentioned in the Austpost docs (and elsewhere in these forums) Weight additions and calculations are not a function of the shipping modules.. they are performed by zencart itself (bear with me).

What the shipping module recieves to calculate on are the number of parcels and the weight of those parcels.

You have set your max shipping weight to 500gm (I still don't know the weight of your test product(s)), but if you happen to place a 500gm product in your cart, and you have zero tare weight, the zencart weight code would accept this as being within limits, and the shipping module will be asked to quote on 1 parcel weighing exactly 500gms. If you place a 1kg item in your shopping cart the zc code will honour your max weight limit and the shipping module will be asked to quote on 2 parcels weighing exactly 500gms each.

The AP module always errs on the side of caution, and will consider 500gm too close to the borderline to travel at 500gm or less rates, and will declare this product to be too heavy for the 500gm satchels. If no other suitable shipping methods are enabled you'll get the cant get a valid quote error message.

I'd assume that if you have the 3kg satchels enabled they would show up.

I'd also assume that if you drop your product weight and/or your maximum shipping weight to 499gm you'll find the satchels will then (probably) show up.

If your product weight was 499gm, and your tare weight was 1gm the satchels would not show up.

As you can see, I'm still making assumptions here (I still have no product weight data or URL to check or verify this)

I probably did you no favours earlier when I responded to your question in the way it was written, namely by tellling you how to do what your asked, rather than trying to find out what you was trying to do (or why you felt the need to do it).

On the other hand, you were explaining a whole lot of totally different problems back in the first message (regualr parcel quotes being way too high).

Seriously though, I do think that that nice round magic number '500' is probably the explanation to some of what you are seeing, and I do think you need to re-evaluate what you need or require in regards to shipping... If you really do only wish to allow prepaid satchels only, and with only one item per satchel then the cost per item shipping rates will be far more suitable to your needs... if for no other reason than it won't be dependent on other servers in order to provide quotes.

However, if you have a somewhat varied range of products and you are happy to combine shipping on any and all products in the shopping cart without having to worry about 'what will it fit into'
then the AustPost module is the way to go, but to get the most out of it you will need to give it the maximum flexibilty possible.. in other words you will allow parcels up to 20kgs to be acceptable (don't try to force everything into a 500gm bags)

You should only dissallow shipping methods that you explicitely do NOT want. Eg, COD.

Then all being well, no matter what products or how many items a customer places in the cart, the AP module will only show those options applicable to that package.

Lemme know if my current assumtptions and guesswork is on the right track, and PLEASE include a URL if not.

Cheers
Rod

RodG:

I've no idea what you are trying to prove by entering test data ranging in values that make little sense in the real world (unless you are selling feathers), in which case you'll get better results by enabling the letter rates.

If you want to get any sense out of it, use sensible inputs.

Rhetorical question. If you are as experienced as you say you are, why the hell are you doing things the "pain staking way" when you would clearly know there are better solutions.

And finally, I have already deduced and told you why you are getting the quotes that you are getting based on the data you are providing.
Namely, your test item is being split up into three individual parcels, each costing $4.20 each.

You apparenlty already know how the AP module works, but I'll redresh your memory anyway... if packages are overweight they get split into multiple parcels before the AustPost module sees them. .
If the package is oversized then the Australia post module splits it into multiple parcels.
IOW, if you have a 20kg maximum, and an item weighing 54kg, based on the weight alone the AP module will be asked to quote on 3 parcels@ 18kgs each.
If those parcels turn out to be oversized, say 110cm, the AP module will again split them to produce 6 parcels, 9kgs each and 55cm long.

All of this assumes the package can be split.
IF you happen to have a single item in the cart that weighs 54kgs and is 110cm long it will still be quoted according to the above 'rules'
Needless to say you won't be able to actually post this item unless you do split it up, so it is really up to the store owner to ensure they don't enter data that can't possibly be delivered via AP.

Anyway, the bottom line still hasn't changed, your test data is pretty darn useless. THe result you are getting can, and has been explained, and they are perfectly legitimate and valid results for the data you are using.

In other words, there is NOTHING for you to fix. It is working perfectly.

GIGO

Rod

I understood what you were saying but could not understand
why it was being split. If it exceeded the max dimensions then it should be split but in the testing data the dimensions never changed, hence why would it be spillt the pacel up.

Well it ended up being the minimum shipping weight. It was set to 20. So anything over 20 weight units was be split. Hence why 20.5 was causing the next pricing bracket.

All fixed. Thank you very much for your help. :clap:

Snype:

I understood what you were saying but could not understand why it was being split.

Even though I clearly stated "You apparently already know how the AP module works, but I'll refresh your memory anyway... if packages are overweight they get split into multiple parcels before the AustPost module sees them. ."

Snype:

Well it ended up being the minimum shipping weight. It was set to 20.

I think you'll find it was the MAXIMUM shipping weight.
Oh, and if it was set to '20' it was because that was what you set it to. (The default is 50).

Snype:

So anything over 20 weight units was be split. Hence why 20.5 was causing the next pricing bracket.

All fixed. Thank you very much for your help. :clap:

It could've been sorted weeks ago if you'd read any of the several other threads covering this exact same problem, or perhaps if you just took more time reading my replies rather than arguing with me about them. http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/images/smilies/smartass.gif

Cheers
Rod.

Hi Rod,

May I know how does this $defitems variable works in your AusPost Improved 2.1.3 module? and what's the optimum value I should set it to?

Thanks.

BW2008:

Hi Rod,

May I know how does this $defitems variable works in your AusPost Improved 2.1.3 module? and what's the optimum value I should set it to?

Thanks.

You don't set $defitems to anything. The module is using this as a counter for the number of items in the shopping cart that don't have any explicit dimensions set. Used for calculating the cube of the parcel.

This method has proven to have a couple of shortcomings and the code has been totally reworked for the next release (hopefully avialable within a week).

Cheers
Rod

I am almost there setting up the Austpost module. The prices shown by the Austpost server so far seem to work for me for every item except a particular "letter" size overseas. (It's actually a CD in a CD mailer - but I never say as much.)

Taking New Zealand as an example, here are the actual prices which apply - quoted by the Austpost website:

Destination Country: NEW ZEALAND
Location: Zone A
Letter Weight: Over 50g Up To 125g
Article Type: Letter

ECI Documents $33.80 2-3 work days
Air Mail $2.80 3-4 work days

The Product entries in Zencart show:

Product Weight: 0.055(kg)
Product Height (cm): 0.5
Product Length (cm): 20
Product Width (cm): 15

Currency is Australian (default)
The tare I use is 25% (taking it to almost 0.07kg)
No Handling Fees apply.

But Zencart gives the following:

ECI Documents: $33.80 (no problem here)
Letter: $5.10

Clearly, the Letter price above is incorrect. The weight, the dimensions, appear to be correct for the $2.80 website quote. The automatic quote is $2.30 more. Why?

I have searched all the forums for a possible solution, but I'm stumped.

Sorry - I made a small error - a $1.00 Handling Fee IS being added, but that still makes a $1.30 error.

tpeck:

Sorry - I made a small error - a $1.00 Handling Fee IS being added, but that still makes a $1.30 error.

Try a different destination country, ie, USA or UK.

I think the difference is because because I have been a bit slack with my coding. Australia Post has several different overseas zones with different charges for each. This is no problem with parcels, because they are dynamically priced according to the correct zone, but the letter rates are effectively 'hard coded' so rather than create tables and checks for the 4 different letter sizes and 5 (?) different zones (20 variants all up) the code caculations are based on the letter size and the most expensive zone. (only 4 variants).

You are the first to report this discrepency. I actually expected to be told about it over a year ago when the letter rates were first indroduced, but since no one has I have assumed that the discrepency is pretty insignificant and no one has really been bothered about it, or, more than likely, there aren't that many Australian zencart users that sell letter sized items in their stores.

Anyway, if you can confirm my suspicions I'd greatly appreciate it (and also to ensure that there isn't another possible cause for your problem).

As to whether I'll get around to 'fixing' it... hard to say at this stage, it seems like it will be a lot of work (both coding and CPU usage), just to determine which postal zone any given country exists in. As far as I know this information isn't available in any electronically usable format.

Cheers
RodG

Thanks for the info. I can help you here (I think) if you want to fix this.

To begin with, yes, regardless of the zone destination (UK, USA, Brazil, China etc.) the cost is - as you say - hard-wired to $4.10 (you know this, but it proves it is not some other problem!)

I don't know how many others would be sending a DVD or two OS in a standard CD mailer, but I would imagine it might be a few in the future.

Before I chanced upon your mod, I worked out all the country codes for the four Zones in the Austpost website. So, I can assist by supplying you with this info - here 'tis:

Zone A: NZ

Zone B: AF,AS,BD,BT,BN,KH,CN,CK,TP,FJ,PF,GU,HK,IN,ID,JP,KI,KP,KR,LA,MO,MY,MV,MH,FM,MM,NR,NP,NC,NU,MP,PK,PW,PG,PH,PN,WS,SG,SB,LK,TW,TH,TK,TO,TV,VU,VN,WF

Zone C: BH,CA,KM,IR,IQ,IL,JO,KW,LB,MU,MX,OM,QA,RE,PM,SA,SY,AE,US,UM,YE

Zone D: AL,DZ,AO,AI,AG,AR,AM,AW,AC,AT,AZ,BS,BB,BY,BE,BZ,BJ,BM,BO,BA,BW,BR,IO,BG,BF,BI,CM,CV,KY,CF,TD,CL,CO,CG,CD,CR,CI,HR,CU,CY,CZ,DK,DJ,DM,DO,EC,EG,SV,GQ,ER,EE,ET,FK,FI,FR,GF,GA,GM,GE,DE,GH,GI,GR,GL,GD,GP,GT,GN,GW,GY,HT,VA,HN,HU,IS,IE,IT,JM,KZ,KE,KG,LS,LR,LY,LI,LT,LU,MK,MG,MW,ML,MT,MQ,MR,MD,MN,ME,MS,MA,MZ,NA,NL,AN,NI,NE,NG,NO,PA,PY,PE,PL,PT,PR,RO,RU,RW,KN,LC,VC,ST,SN,SP,SC,SL,SK,SI,SO,ZA,ES,SD,SR,SZ,SE,CH,TJ,TZ,TG,TT,TY,TN,TR,TM,TC,UG,UA,UK,UY,UZ,VE,VG,VI,ZM,ZW

Clearly, the last lot comes to more than 255 characters!

If you need any more hack work done - I'm willing.

Terry

tpeck:

Thanks for the info. I can help you here (I think) if you want to fix this.
Terry

Bastard. Now that you've done the hard yakka it would be rude if I didn't take advantage of it now wouldn't it. <grin>

Thanks again.
RodG (I've been somewhat bogged down for a few days).