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Resolved - Flat prices for both US and International orders?


RinaldiStudio

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Hi guys -

 

OK, in lieu of the recent USPS changes, our store would like to offer two simple flat prices for our products. Right now we sell one book, we are a small start-up publisher, and will add new books in the future.

 

I've tried to set it up in the Shipping Methods module, but I can't seem to achieve what I am wanting to do. Currently we are setup under the existing USPS shipping module.

 

For US orders:

I want the US address shipping cost of $6 Flat rate for 1 book, any zip code.

I would like to add a $2.50 bump for each book of 2 or more. (2 books is $6 + $2.50, 3 books is $6 + $5, etc.)

 

For International orders:

I want an International Flat Rate shipping cost of $18 (any country/one book)

I would like to add a $8 bump for each book 2 or more. Same setup, just for International.

 

Any thoughts? I understand how to set one overall price for everything, but how do I set up a system for two unique scenarios governed by location (US & International)? The carrier is not important to the customer, but will likely still use USPS on the back end.

 

Best,

 

Mike

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Hi guys -

 

OK, in lieu of the recent USPS changes, our store would like to offer two simple flat prices for our products. Right now we sell one book, we are a small start-up publisher, and will add new books in the future.

 

I've tried to set it up in the Shipping Methods module, but I can't seem to achieve what I am wanting to do. Currently we are setup under the existing USPS shipping module.

 

For US orders:

I want the US address shipping cost of $6 Flat rate for 1 book, any zip code.

I would like to add a $2.50 bump for each book of 2 or more. (2 books is $6 + $2.50, 3 books is $6 + $5, etc.)

 

For International orders:

I want an International Flat Rate shipping cost of $18 (any country/one book)

I would like to add a $8 bump for each book 2 or more. Same setup, just for International.

 

Any thoughts? I understand how to set one overall price for everything, but how do I set up a system for two unique scenarios governed by location (US & International)? The carrier is not important to the customer, but will likely still use USPS on the back end.

 

Best,

 

Mike

I dont think we can do this, i posted days ago and the moderator didnt give me a straight answer.  All i want to do is charge a flat rate figure for every order, cant get much simpler than that.  Using UPS sucks, it is always way off with the ridiculous weights i have to enter, the weights arent even close.

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Mike, I think By Weight would work for you. We will have as options US Media Rate and International Rate.

 

Get the weight of one book. (Hopefully when you add more selections to your inventory, each book will weigh about the same.) Let's say each book is 2lbs.

 

Create a weight band such as:

2:6.00,4:8.50,6:11.00 and for each 2lbs add 2.50 until it gets ridiculous (typically 70lbs).

 

Place this in Zone 1 Media Rate. The countries would be US.

 

Create another weight band such as:

2:18.00,4:26.00,6:34.00 and for each 2lbs add 8.00 until it gets ridiculous (typically 40lbs).

 

Place this in Zone 2 International Rate. The countries would be blank to cover the rest of the universe not covered by earlier zones (I think that's how it works).

 

Be sure the product's parameters have 2.00 set as the weight.

 

You can actually ship by whatever carrier you choose. Using USPS and their calculations to add the shipping costs to the order doesn't mean you actually have to use USPS as the carrier for your packages.

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Mike, I think By Weight would work for you. We will have as options US Media Rate and International Rate...

 

Create another weight band such as:

2:18.00,4:26.00,6:34.00 and for each 2lbs add 8.00 until it gets ridiculous (typically 40lbs).

 

Place this in Zone 2 International Rate. The countries would be blank to cover the rest of the universe not covered by earlier zones (I think that's how it works).

 

Thanks and I did get it to work with US orders. 

 

My book weight is 1.5 exactly, so I used that and took it out until we trip the Flat Rate packaging costs, and then I simply repeat it. Here is it for those that want to do the same. We are lucky 10 books fits perfectly into the Medium Flat Rate box for $12.

 

Media Mail - 1.50:5.00,3:7.50,4.50:12.00,6:12.00,7.5:12.00,9:12:00,10.5:12.00,12:12.00,13.5:12.00,15:12.00

Priority Mail - 1.50:7.50,3:12.00,4.50:12.00,6:12.00,7.5:12.00,9:12:00,10.5:12.00,12:12.00,13.5:12.00,15:12.00

 

However, I cannot get it to work for any other country besides US, CA, and MX, (CA,MX is listed in zone 2). I leave Zone 3 blank and I get the dreaded message "that there is no shipping method available..." for all other countries.

 

I have three test addresses around the world and all three come up the same. I started to plug in other customer addresses, and nothing, same error. 

 

I'm stumped yet again on this software. Why it is so complicated.... ugh.

 

I even tried to add other ISO codes into the Zone 2 to see if it would at least read it. I tried to UK,JP,ES and nothing. Yet US,CA,MX works????

 

 

I remember trying to get the "by weight" function to work when I first installed CubeCart and had the same trouble, and still can't solve.

 

Any other ideas on how it reads the ISO codes?

 

Here is how I have it now:

Zone 1 is US (and works perfectly as a I want it to)

 

Zone 2 is CA,MX (Canada and Mexico). I have the rates listed similar to US, but a little higher. (it works perfectly too)

 

And as advised, I have no ISO codes listed in Zone 3, just the weight/price line, which should cover the rest of the countries not already listed in 1 & 2. (and no countries besides those mention are working)

 

Does it have to with the Allowed Zones tab at the top? (I have my all of my countries in there.)

 

There is nothing currently in Disallowed Zones.

 

US, CA and MX are listed in Allowed and they work, but so is UK, JP and ES etc., and none work...

 

It's admittedly starting to a bit frustrating, but I do really appreciate your immense help all over the boards.

 

I switched back on USPS for now...

 

Best,

 

Mike

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I also just tried it with US in Zone 1only, and...to basically get at least a two zone system working -

 

Zones 2, 3, & 4 countries are left blank, with only the price/weight ratios in for Zone 2. (Zones 3 & 4 are all empty).

 

Still nothing... can't get it to read any other country besides US, CA and MX.

 

So I started to add the ISO codes into Zones 3 and 4 just to see if I can get anything to come up for in the shopping cart as "by weight"... nothing. Same damn error message box appears above the cart no matter what I seem to do. I have all my countries loaded in the Allowed Zones, so it makes no sense why US, CA and MX work and the rest don't...

 

So I switched back on the USPS module for the meantime to keep taking orders for now. But I will say the price changes has slowed incoming overseas orders by around 75-90% in the last week. This is devastating us at 60% overseas shipments from our direct sales.

 

I reset the product weight to 1lb (down from 1.5lb) with USPS turned on (zero packaging and handling costs). We will take a hit on International, and it's close to what we were going to offer as a fixed rate. It comes up as $17USD for Japan, Spain, UK, etc. and we were going to make it $18. The true price is $21 give or take, plus we eat all fees from our fulfillment contract right now. 

 

Onward and upward... shipping sucks. There I said it, we all know it. No other way to say it, kinda bummed all around to be perfectly honest.

 

Best,

 

Mike

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Yah, I'll do that and delete all of them. It's not working as is with the countries loaded in Allowed Zones, so clearing it out might help regardless. I did try deleting the ones I wanted and it made no difference, but maybe deleting them all will work.

 

We are functional under USPS rates right now, I tweaked the product weight in the cart to get us close enough, so I have time to sort this out.

 

Worst case, if we can't fix it, I'll open a support ticket.

 

If 5.2.1 is bug free, I'll do an update too.

 

Thanks for the help!

 

Mike

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OK, after giving this some dedicated time on station, in the "By Weight" module page, at the top where it says General, Allowed Zones, Disabled Zones... 

 

I emptied all the countries from the Allowed and Disabled Zones, so both were completely empty.

 

I pulled up an ISO code chart online and started adding them into my Zone 3 ISO line. 

 

It worked... yeah!

 

I have US as Zone 1, Canada and Mexico as Zone 2, and Zone 3 as "International" with the remaining two-letter ISO codes listed, separated by commas, with no spaces in between.

 

My weight:price ratios all come up properly in the shopping cart, and I was able to proof this by leaving USPS switched on too, and the cart options showed both By Weight and USPS rates listed.

 

I would delete a country to reverse check myself, and the By Weight option would disappear from the shopping cart, I'd go back and add that ISO back in Zone 3 and it worked again.

 

I also had England listed as UK and its ISO code is GB, so that was my error. 

 

My desired shipping structure was a fixed rate, with a set product weight of 1.5lbs:

 

orig.jpg

 

Hope this helps to solve the By Weight tricks...the confusion stems from the Allowed Zones tab, it should be eliminated, I would never think not to fill it up. It makes no sense honestly, given there is basically no manual or instructions to fall back upon to figure this out. I appreciate having the forum, but its tough when being the webmaster is not first or primary skill set.

 

Best,

 

Mike

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Glad that worked for you. I think the Allowed and Disallowed tabs are on every shipping plugin - whether they are needed or not. I DO have a Disallow on the USPS one that I use now, but I've kept the By Weight one set up, but disabled, for those times when USPS was not working properly.

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I would think by default the ISO Codes not listed are basically the disallowed zones? Or am I completely misinterpreting those tab functions? If I don't put the ISO country code in, the customer can't order it anyway for that delivery address... maybe I'm overthinking it all. Lol!

 

I'm going live with By Weight today, so I'll see how it turns out.

 

Best,

 

Mike

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