New UK Post code shipping module, needs ideas for a wish list

[da8iwr]

Hi There i have been commissioned to make a UK Post code shipping module by one of my clients as he hates what is in VM now.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_postcode_areas_in_the_United_Kingdom

I have found these postcodes as a list which i will add to the module.

I will build and release this as GPL, so people can take and modify it, but rather than make it very static, i thought i will find out what others want and try to make it to suit a general audience, please give me your wish list of how it will work.

I'm not sure whether to make it work with

• Free after a total cart value
• Weight
• Fixed cost
• Tiered pricing
• Total cart value in levels

Any ideas?

[furnitureman]

Ian, We get charged different rates by our furniture carriers based on the volume of goods that we ship.  Standard mainland postcodes have a fixed rate and Scottish Highlands postcodes are higher and then the smaller Islands around the UK have different rates as does Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.  It would be good to be able to drag postcodes into a delivery category such as standard mainland, Scottish Highlands, Scottish Islands, IOW, Isle of Man, Channel Islands etc and to have a full detailed list of postcodes that covered all these regions and to create your own names for the regions.  

The shipping system that we use at the moment via Romancart and Virtuemart works by allocating a weight figure to each product and then adding shipping prices to the various tiered bands of weights so that it easy to manage and control.  The weight doesnt have to be the actual weight of the product.  This is by far the best way for us to calculate shipping from a shopping cart to so i would look for something similar if we changed module which we would probably do as the choice is terrible at the moment.  

It would definately be good to have the option to be able to click a few buttons and then all the delivery charges become free over a certain basket value which can be typed in when we run a sale over a weekend or a few weeks and then to un click the option and return to normal shipping rates.  

It would be really handy to have an option to manually change the VAT rate in one box by inputting the rate (15% or 17.5%) which then adjusts the VAT on the delivery based on GROSS tiered delivery rates that are input.  Some work off NET delivery rates which means all the tiered price levels need re calculating and inputting again from 1st Jan 2010 whenVAT changes back to 17.5%.  This is a real pain!  

It would also be good to be able to set a manual maximum delivery charge that would then ignore higher rates in the tiered ranges if this was activated so we could run an offer on max delivery of say £50 rather than the current rate of £80 which we have at the moment.  If this could be done within a few clicks it would be brilliant and if set to zero would be the same as free delivery which again could be run for a weekend for a special offer with very little work involved to change the rates.

If you could also offer the functionality to add different shipping companies or speeds of delivery to the tiered rates then customer may be able to choose a specific delivery company or a quicker or slower delivery which would be reflected in the price.  This would suit some companies but others might not be bothered about this but if the functionality was there i think people would start to use it if they had a use for it.

I'm sure many others with have comments and suggestions as every business if different.  It would be worth looking at the Romancart system as thats really simple and very functional and maybe adapting something similar into Virtuemart.  Its important to try and get the module to look proffesional within the shopping cart as well.  Good luck with this and i for one would be interested in trialling a new module with a few more bells and whistles on it.

Thanks Dave, Top Furniture Ltd

[cinos]

Hi there,

Obviously I can only speak for what I would want personally, but hopefully some of the things I mention will be useful to you. 

Currently my shop uses Business Post for next day delivery and they typically have 5 areas within the Uk which all carry different delivery charges. Depending if whether the postcode is in the north of Scotland, Republic of Ireland...etc.

1.   As such, the most important feature for me would be for the shipping module to be able to determine which area a specific Postcode is located within and charge accordingly.


The ability to take into account the total weight of an order would be a close second. At present I have had to enter in each weight range separately which is both time consuming and limiting. Going back to Business Posts charge structure; items up to 10kg all carry the same charge. However once past this limit the charge increases by a certain amount of pence per extra kilogram. This has forced me to create a very long list of delivery options which will take an age to edit should I need to change carrier at a later date.

2.   What would be really handy is if the module could provide a single page for each delivery method (Business Post, Royal Mail 1st Class, 2nd, Standard Parcels, etc). With options to specify the standard (lowest charge) then ‘user set’ weight limits with extra charge options, all kept neatly for easy editing.


My shop also offers cover options for delivery  (i.e up to £100 cover, Up to £200 ,etc) and at present when someone places an order all options appear for the customer to choose. For instance on a £20 order the customer will still be given choices for standard cover of £39, plus cover for £100, £200 etc.

3.   As such it would be really good if the shipping module could also take into account the total value of an order and limit certain delivery options from appearing.


I’m really interested to see how this project turns out as it would be really helpful. After the excellent Frooglefeed module, I’m sure you have what it takes to make something brilliant.

If I think of anything else I will let you know. 

[Judge G]

I need a mix of weight and price.
below 1 kg would be £2.95, above would be £5.95. but over £100 would be free delivery in the UK
european would be under 2kg £20, 2-4Kg £40, over 4kg £50, there is no free delivery over £100 on this.
It would be great to make it simple to choose as well, atm I have to make a product that customers choose, which for obvious reasons customers dont and try to get free delivery!

[aqroo]

Here in the US, UPS and FedEx both base their pricing based on a nationwide zone map. It would be very helpful to have the ability to setup the zone that you ship from, and then a matching of the list of US zip codes to the corresponding zone. I think UPS and FedEx make this matching available via flat text/.csv file to make the loading process less arduous.

If the plugin has this ability, the basket could automatically calculate the number of zones the package has to travel and compute an accurate shipping quote based on the result.

Great ideas! Keep up the good work!

[helenbn]

Hi Ian,

To make this work for the US too would be great, but difficult. (Play scarey music...)

Enter tax into the equation. The US has tax rules that vary vary vary according to each state selling from depending on where it is selling to. Just that confusing statement might make you run screaming.

Now this does relate to your shipping module because some states tax shipping, some handling, some shipping and handling, some shipping one rate and handling another rate and this is effected by it's own set of tax rules.

For example, in Virginia you tax only sales shipping to Virginia. You also tax handling but not shipping. However VM lumps shipping and handling in the same line. So in Virginia, if it is worded together and it is shipped within Virginia, then you have to charge tax on S&H. You end up paying tax on something that you really don't have to.

But if you ship it to any other state you do not charge tax and there is no way to not charge tax on shipping and handling. VM does not have a way to control tax on S&H by ship to address.

So what I did with a Virginia store is change the VM wording from "Shipping and Handling" to just "Shipping" and not charge any tax on it to any state shipped to. By leaving out the word "Handling" I have satisfied the tax laws in Virginia.

This was a simple solution, but other states have much more complex laws.

So I think I would like to see a way to control tax on shipping location.

And I would like to see it have the option to break the shipping and handling line apart and choose this tax option.

I also use free shipping after you spend a certain amount.

Thanks,
Helen

[Woody5k]

Hi There,

My daughter operates a card crafting web business and the problem she has with the Virtumart module is trying to get a compromise between weight and size that could be tagged to an item. The best way to explain what I mean is to give you an example.

Most of the items sold are small in size and small in weight and would go in a A5 Jiffy bag, if somebody then orders one 12" x 12" sheet of card (value 0.65) the order now has to be shipped in a cardboard box due to its size and required protection. In this instance the value of the order only increases by 0.65p but jumps in P&P quite considerably

In this instance it would be ideal if the selection of such an item in the cart would automatically choose an appropriate type of P&P.

Our site only ships to the UK and as such it would be ideal if only genuine UK postcodes would allow you to proceed beyond the cart this would prevent persons in such as the Republic of Ireland and mainland Europe from making payments with an inappropriate postcode. This could be a switchable facility so as to not restrict other users shipping worldwide

I hope I have not rambled on to much and hope that you can accommodate these requests.

[mparrish]

Ian

Some good suggestions from furnitureman.  We would like to see;
- weight and volume based carriage charges
- set max carriage charge value
- being able to print shipping labels from the orders list (can do this with another module that we have added, but would be better integrated in your shipping module and add in flexibility)
- being able to set free carriage over a certain order value
- allowing the carriage charges to differ by product category within Virtuemart ( we sell a wide variety of product types and some of them need different carriage charging mechanisms)
- add in tracking facilities for carriers from within the Order List screen

Look forward to trialing the new module.

Mike

[richardp7]

Hi Ian

I'd just like to see it simple - different postcodes have different charges as required (perhaps with a maximum carriage cost), plus the opportunity to give free carriage over certain amounts.

In addition, being able to also send package abroad.

regards

Richard

PS - when can you get it done - I have sites that would use it!

[suziec]

We have about 5 different suppliers with different shipping rates. This gets very confusing when customers order several products at one time. We would manually have to go in and create a rate for each weight bracket.

Is it possible to link shipping rates to specified wholesaler? And for this to also cope when one product bought from one wholesaler, and another from a different wholesaler?

Cheers

[da8iwr]

Anything is possible with some serious hacking, but as a standard system this wont be possible i don't think.

You will either need to add a new field which will be your supplier, so the shipping module will know which one to use, or you could use the manufacturer i suppose, but i don't think it will be easy at all to set up.

You will also need some form of feed form your shipping suppliers, so the site can keep upto date records of the costs.

If this was all done, i suppsoe it could be done though, i will have to have think about this one

[Alex S]

Hi Ian,

Just wondering how this project is coming along. I have since found a really good use for this idea. We own a local retail outlet, so we'd like to offer customers who have a 'WV' postcode free shipping. Anyone who doesn't have a 'WV' shipping postcode has to pay full whack for delivery.

What would be REALLY useful though is to limit the 'free delivery perimeter' by postcode even further. We are based at WV2, so WV14 is a looong drive away, so if we could limit free deliveries to maybe WV10, that would be even better.

This would be a perfect plugin to Virtuemart. I look forward to hear how this is coming along. Many thanks,

[jayskibob]

wow lot's of responses.

I just wanted to send positive feedback and hope that this UK shipping module works as well as hoped - we are all routing for you - hehehe

keep us posted on events

Jay

[da8iwr]

Sorry for the loss of contact... the interest is not lost, its just I have a huge contract to finish by the 15th, and it will be cutting it fine as it is.

After the 15th, I will be looking back at this module

Regards
Ian

[heywood79]

Hi Ian

I have a client who wants to use VM, I've never used it before and I'm staggered by the lack of modules catering for UK stores!

What I would be looking for in this instance is the ability to deliver with costs based on weight and by postcode. I.e. extra charges for the outlying UK areas.

My client also does local deliveries free, only to certain postcodes and some postcodes depend upon a minimum spend whilst others don't!

I'm going to have a play around with what VM offers and see what I can come up with.

Cheers
Rob