Shipping Estimator/Calculator

[floorcleaners.net]

When estimating the shipping of a product after adding it to the basket, the estimate given for the State and City does not match up to what is calculated during check out.
When a customer checks out the price of shipping is higher than what was quoted to them.
I know that it is estimated and linked to UPS Online Tools Commercial Rate, but we should have the option to have it linked to our account or a residential address, so the estimated or calculated shipping rate is exactly what they will pay at check out.
Some of our customers are leaving the site because the estimated price of shipping is different upon check out.
We would like some kind of method to choose our own rates that we have with our account on UPS or have the rates that are listed on the website that the residential customer see's be correct upon check out.

Thanks!

FloorCleaners.net

[afm]

Check out this post,

viewtopic.php?f=44&t=8435&p=36085&hilit ... ial#p36085

It shows how to coerce the estimator into showing residential rates.

But here are some things to think about:

• Your competitors also have shipping cost estimators and they have probably configured theirs to assume a business address so they appear to be cheaper.
• There will probably be more customers that rate shop and leave because you charge more for shipping than customers that leave because the final cost is higher than the estimate.
• Both UPS and FedEx have extensive databases of addresses (basically every address they have ever delivered to). They know if an address is residential or business. If the estimate assumes residential, but the address is really a business, then the shipping rate during checkout will be different.
• The only way to get the estimator and checkout to be *exactly* the same is to collect the entire address in the estimator.
• If you are doing that, you might as well drop the estimator.

[AbleMods]

Man those are all great points.

I love the reality of brutal honest

[Jaz]

I think the biggest improvement would be to add the international support. Maybe I am missing the point, but is it that hard to just tie this into the main calculator in the cart? Also, is there a reason that customers need to put in more than their zip code to get a shipping rate?

~Jaz

[AbleMods]

I think the biggest improvement would be to add the international support. Maybe I am missing the point, but is it that hard to just tie this into the main calculator in the cart? Also, is there a reason that customers need to put in more than their zip code to get a shipping rate?

~Jaz

Different carriers require different bits of information to accurately calculate a shipping estimate.

[Jaz]

OK - that makes since for the information needed. What is the reason that the minibasket calculator can't pull its data from the main shipping calculator?

~Jaz

[AbleMods]

OK - that makes since for the information needed. What is the reason that the minibasket calculator can't pull its data from the main shipping calculator?

~Jaz

It is. But more information is known during checkout than what is known during anonymous visitors checking shipping rates. Thus there always stands a chance the estimator rate will be slightly different than the final rate.

You trade some accuracy in the returned rate for less effort to get the visitor an estimate.

[TTMedia]

I notice on the new shipping estimator, they have 4 fields =

Country, State, City and Postal Code.

Do you really need all these fields? And would you not need an additional field for residential/business?

[AbleMods]

I notice on the new shipping estimator, they have 4 fields =

Country, State, City and Postal Code.

Do you really need all these fields? And would you not need an additional field for residential/business?

Depends on the carrier involved. Some will take just a zipcode but will not be entirely accurate. Others require more detail to give any quote at all.

I've thought about adding a Res/Comm switch on it, but it's anyones guess as to how "honest" site visitors will be with it.

[Jaz]

For most of us, shipping is just another income and expense. You make a little, you loose a little. I don't think for must of us, charging the exact shipping amount is going to make or break us. Many large companies just have flat rate or similar shipping and let it all even out in the end. From this stand point I see why the business / residential box could be more trouble than it is worth. I just figure everything as residential, as most of my shipments are. Occasionally pocket a few bucks if it goes to a business. For the customers though, many will abandon the site if they can't get a shipping quote. Shipping cost is the biggest question we get and we have a fairly simple shipping calculator on our non Able site.

To me the bigger problem is that there is a drop down box to select your country and there is no way to give a quote outside US or Canada. This will confuse many customers. I have had to add instructions to the estimator for them.

For me, if the package is going to a country beside the US of Canada, the shipping is going to be about the same to all countries, depending only weight. I would be happy if I could set up a weight dependant manual shipping table that could be referenced by my international customers. It would not account for some of my oversized orders, but would give them something to reference and reduce cart abandonment.

[kastnerd]

There are a few different requests all regarding shipping.

How is shipping caluclated for multiple items?
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=9093

Shipping Multiple items
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=9093

Dimension Change with Variations
viewtopic.php?f=45&t=8938&start=0

Shipping rate differences
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=6506

USPS shipping rates (multiple boxes)
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=9076

Shipping weight on multiple quantities
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=7538

Multiple packages
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=8974

USPS shipping rates are incorrect (Box size)
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=8828

Added weight for packing
viewtopic.php?f=45&t=9250

Adding flat-rate shipping cost to individual products
viewtopic.php?f=45&t=9027

[kastnerd]

UPS Discounted rates
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=9604


Omitting UPS shipping from PO Box addresses
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=9681

Shipping weight problem
viewtopic.php?f=42&t=9528

[kastnerd]

http://bugs.ablecommerce.com/show_bug.cgi?id=7540

I would like to see this someday, but it will be a major change. It's not high
on anyone else's list, so I'm shifting it to future version.

This is high on my list. How many other people need shipping improved?

[Jaz]

I guess I have taken a different approach. I have found that most of my shipments are ground in the US. To make this easy for most people, I have just set price based shipping rates with free sipping over $150. I find this is simpler to my customers because they can see their shipping prices on every page. In the end, it all works out. Some pay a little more and some a little less, and a little free shipping is cheap marketing.

However, ground is not always an acceptable shipping method for my customers. Sometimes they want international or second day air. This then needs a calculator. I think a quick improvement that would solve half the problems would be for AC to use the largest item to calculate dimensional weight in all situations, instead of dropping the dimensional weight calculation all together if there is more than one item in the cart. I have a lot of individual items that can't ship with certain shipping methods. As soon as a second item is add to the cart, the calculation is overridden and I have to contact the customers and tell them that I can’t ship it to them, or they need a different shipping method. This will not solve all the problems, but would be a great start. After all, there is no situation where a package will get smaller when another item is added.

[kastnerd]

Most of my shipments are in 2 boxes. And many of them are 2nd day or or international.

[kastnerd]

I think a quick improvement that would solve half the problems would be for AC to use the largest item to calculate dimensional weight in all situations, instead of dropping the dimensional weight calculation all together if there is more than one item in the cart. I have a lot of individual items that can't ship with certain shipping methods. As soon as a second item is add to the cart, the calculation is overridden and I have to contact the customers and tell them that I can’t ship it to them, or they need a different shipping method. This will not solve all the problems, but would be a great start. After all, there is no situation where a package will get smaller when another item is added.

This is a good idea. The current system cant get a accurate quote for any of my orders. Making it use the largest product in the order would make 70% of my orders correct. Much better then zero %

[Jaz]

Yea, I am all about going for the low hanging friut!

[kastnerd]

Dose anyone from Able have an update on this bug?
http://bugs.ablecommerce.com/show_bug.cgi?id=7540

[kastnerd]

Any update on this?

[kastnerd]

I think a quick improvement that would solve half the problems would be for AC to use the largest item to calculate dimensional weight in all situations, instead of dropping the dimensional weight calculation all together if there is more than one item in the cart. I have a lot of individual items that can't ship with certain shipping methods. As soon as a second item is add to the cart, the calculation is overridden and I have to contact the customers and tell them that I can’t ship it to them, or they need a different shipping method. This will not solve all the problems, but would be a great start. After all, there is no situation where a package will get smaller when another item is added.

This would be nice to have it calculate using the largest product, Also if USPS supported dimensions.

[kastnerd]

Any plans on upgrading the shipping part of Able?

[RichWendrock]

The shopper should be able to select Home Address or Business Address when estimating the shipping cost. This would provide a more accurate estimate.

Thanks,
Richard

[ErinS]

The shopper should be able to select Home Address or Business Address when estimating the shipping cost. This would provide a more accurate estimate.

Thanks,
Richard

I'm a newbie to AbleCommerce, but I thought I'd chime in and concur with Richard here. Estimating shipping cost is just that, an estimate. Unless you supply both addresses (to be exact), then you're not going to get an exact cost. Also, shouldn't we taking into consideration size, weight and so on? Either way, I think this simple implementation would help . . . if it hasn't already been added to AbleCommerce, of course. =)

Thanks!!!

[Jaz]

what happens if they claim the address is a business address, but it is actually home address? Wouldn't they be under charged? If this is the case when it be best to always calculate residential. I guess we give away enough free shipping that it is nice when we can make a few bucks back. I guess it really depends upon your business model.