UK Postcode/County/Country code zones module

[alanB]

Hi all,

I'm starting a new thread for the UK Postcode/County/country code zones shipping module.

Please post any bug reports, questions, requests here from now on. When posting please include which version of the module and VirtueMart you are using.

For full details and to download the latest version check out the entry in the VMED (http://extensions.virtuemart.net/index.php?option=com_sobi2&sobi2Task=sobi2Details&catid=3&sobi2Id=442&Itemid=2).

I will post here when a new version is released.

Cheers,

Alan.

[mx5gr]

Hi Alan,

I have been using your shipping module with success, defining two zones using generic postcode ranges. Everything worked fine.

However, we now want to offer two options per postcode range, one for 09:00-17:00 delivery and one for 17:00-20:00.

Thus, I defined 4 zones within the shipping module. However, as it performs postcode range matching, only one (the first one found) is displayed and not the other.

A workaround would be to install your shipping module twice, for the two time groups within the same zone. However that would be very inefficient on the server, as now it requires already 128MB of PHP RAM to be available, as the postcode file is ~2MB long.

I tried to make it work with "Shipping Options", as currently defined in the shipping module. I created a zone 09:00-17:00 with a 0 modifier and a zone 17:00-20:00 with a +5 modifier. HOWEVER, when the order total is over 80 Euros, the customer gets free shipping. Hence, depending to the region (Inside/Outside Attica), he would have only one option, "Inside Attica, Free shipping: €0,00". Instead we get:

Inside Attica, Free shipping: €0,00
Inside Attica [09:00-17:00]: €0,00
Inside Attica [17:00-20:00]: €5,00

Thus, the second line should not appear (he has free shipping). Moreover, the third line should not appear as well, as it has free shipping. The scripts adds the +5 modifier regardless of the free shipping status.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

[alanB]

Hi mx5gr,

hmmm - that's an unforseen interaction between shipping options and free shipping.

Basically there should be a check for free shipping and then not show the options. Or to show the options but at full shipping rate. What do you think the behaviour should be? Someone who is offered free shipping might want to choose to pay for faster delivery or guarenteed delivery slot so I'm leaning towards the latter. Although I could make it an setting - each option could have a free shipping option "Do not show option", "show option with full base rate" or "show option with 0 base rate".

No promise on time scale but I'll add it to the bug list and sort it in the next release.

Cheers,

Alan.

[TWD-Tony]

Hi Alan, continued from the other thread...

"Hi Tony,

Ah right - so in that case it's just a matter of adding in the check for the minimum weight at the start and just returning without outputing a shipping option at all.

Cheers,

Alan."

Should this check be in the code for the shipping options page (to check to see if the postcode module should be called) or in the postcode module code itself?

I guess I should be looking at how you have implemented the check for country and put a similar switch in place?

Thanks

Tony

[mx5gr]

Hi mx5gr,

hmmm - that's an unforseen interaction between shipping options and free shipping.

Basically there should be a check for free shipping and then not show the options. Or to show the options but at full shipping rate. What do you think the behaviour should be? Someone who is offered free shipping might want to choose to pay for faster delivery or guarenteed delivery slot so I'm leaning towards the latter. Although I could make it an setting - each option could have a free shipping option "Do not show option", "show option with full base rate" or "show option with 0 base rate".

No promise on time scale but I'll add it to the bug list and sort it in the next release.

Cheers,

Alan.

Hi Alan,

A simple disabling of the shipping options calculation when in Free Delivery would do. On the other hand, it makes sense that if free delivery is offered, the user should be able to select among business hours or late afternoon deliveries, as they are offered for free for purchases > a 70 Euros (for example).

What you suggest with the drop down for each shipping option solves all cases of shipping options/free shipping combination and is eagerly awaited.

I hope you'll find some time to integrate them by late last week (working on a deadline, I'm not pushing you), otherwise I'll try to figure out a workaround.

Thank you for your time and congrats again for this excellent module.

Regards,

Socrates

[TWD-Tony]

In case anyone needs to know how to disable the UK postcode module for order totals under a certain weight, this is how I did it:

Around line 84 in postcode.php add:

if($d['weight'] <250) {
      echo 'error message';
     
      return false;
      }

Just change <250 to whatever weight threshold you wish to set and change the error message to some text you want to display to tell the customer that the weight of their order does not qualify them for delivery...

[wicko]

I have installed your shipping module as it sounds perfect for what I want on my site. We currently have shipping set to free for UK but the problem is when people purchase just 1 very small item the shipping deletes any profit and quite often costs us. So what I wanted was free shipping for all orders over £30 for instance with a baserate of £2.50 shipping for orders under £30.
But when I tried to set this up and added all the codes and base rate etc and pressed save then the module comes back with an error requesting a license and then deletes all the data I have input which I have to enter again.
I am sure that it is because and am missing something or not setting it up correctly.
Is there any chance you can let me know what I need to configure this.
Many thanks
Wicko

[wicko]

I have tested more with this module and as long as I don't try to add new zone options then the shipping rate calculates ok. But I have only managed to set up for UK as using country code required I set up zones.
Again some advice with setup would be very helpful

[ZatriX_ZA]

Hi Alan,

This module is exactly what I have been looking for, thanks a lot! There is one 'minor' problem, though... It doesn't show in the front-end. I have configured it as per instructions (some confusion about the item bands, but no biggie, I can leave them blank, right?) but when i try to checkout, virtuemart just shows 'select shipping method' and that's it. Other shipping modules work, so it's not the installation, I'm guessing. Any ideas?

[theredrobot]

I'm shipping to the whole of the UK, But would it be possible to configure this module, for different shipping rates for differnt product categories, using 2 different instances?

Instance 1 - shipping rate is free for certain products (using the 'allowed products' feature).

Instance 2 - shipping rate is 6% for all other categories (again using the 'allowed products' feature).

or would I create 2 different 'zones' insert the same full UK postcodes in each, but 1 zone is free shipping, 1 is charging 6% of the total and using 'allowed products' assign which products can get free delivery and which are charged 6%

[Lee Wilson]

Quick question.

For UK tax purposes tax should be calculated on the order plus shipping amount (gross cost amount). Does this module do this ?

From what I can tell standard VM does not add tax to the order total.

Thanks

[chaten]

Hello,  Great plugin, exactly what i needed.  Kills several birds with one stone.

I've found a bug and figured out the problem/solution (if you can call it a solution) 

Problem:

I created two instances with no problems.
I created a third instance and when i went to configure it i got the error message along the lines of: postcode2.cfg.php UNWRITABLE.

I saw that postcode2.cfg.php had not actually been created so i created it manually.  After doing so i saw it was still unwritable so i changed permissions to 744.

After this it came up with another error to do with the shipmailform file as well as a Jloader error.

I thought this was odd as these are joomla/vm files which were obvioulsy working fine for the first two instances.  I left these files alone and just did some  systematic investigation instead.

I found that the error message only appears if you create a new instance outside of the original 1st main instance config page.

eg.  Any instance created in any other instance config page will lead to an error message.

To solve/ work around this: 
To create any new instance, go into the 1st (main) instance config page and then create the new instance.

Hope that makes sense.

Thanks once again for the plugin.  If you need any extra help with the production, feel free to get in touch.   

[wicko]

Great module and managed to set up and run perfectly with FREE UK shipping with £30+ orders.

But the problem I have had is that my PayPal Pro Payment module comes up with an error at checkout and asks to select another shipping method. It is fine with PayPal API.

I have contacted the payment module provider who has said there is a problem with the shipping method which come up with a result that contain illegal characters such as : or ;. I have gone through the module and removed the : from the areas that create the shipping name but this still has not fixed it.

Does anyone know how I can removed these illegal characters from the shipping result?

[Lee Wilson]

I am considering using Paypal Pro so am interested in this development. Can you please post the fix here.

I have not purchased or installed this module yet.

I have already posted this question, but can you tell me whether TAX (VAT) is added to the total order including shipping (as is supposed to under UK law), or is TAX exluded from the shipping amount ?

Thanks

[wicko]

This shipping module has the option to select the relevant tax rate. I have not tested this myself as my site does not add any tax or vat to the orders.

You can connect to a PayPal Pro account ok with the PayPal API module that comes with the latest VM install. However if you use the PayPal Pro module from virtuemart-solutions then you may get errors which is due to illegal characters created by this module. I have had to disable this payment module because of this reason. I do prefer the virtuemart-solutions module as it gives extra security via Centinal.