18 Configure Shipping
A shipping method contains one or more shipping regions and shipping charges.
Your store must contain at least one shipping method that shoppers can select during checkout. If you create and enable more than one shipping method, shoppers choose from a list of the enabled shipping methods. Then, the selected method is associated with the shipping group selected in the shoppers’ order.
If you run multiple sites within a single instance of Retail Digital Commerce, these sites can share shipping methods, or you can create site-specific shipping methods. See Create a shipping method for information about assigning shipping methods to specific sites. See Configure Sites to learn how to create multiple sites.
Create Shipping Regions
Shipping regions specify geographic areas your store will ship to.
Grouping shipping destinations into regions makes it easier to create shipping methods. For example, to create a ground shipping method for a store based in the United States, start by creating a shipping region that includes the 48 contiguous U.S. states. When a customer enters a shipping address either at checkout or when creating a profile, the logic in the Customer Address widget allows the customer to pick from only countries and regions that are used in enabled shipping methods.
To create a shipping region, follow these steps:
Create a Shipping Method
You must create at least one shipping method, even if your shipping is handled by a third-party fulfillment system.
Retail Digital Commerce supports the following shipping methods:
- Internally priced shipping method - A shipping method created in the administration interface whose price and availability is determined during checkout using internal rules.
- Externally priced shipping method - A shipping method created in the administration interface whose price and availability is determined using a combination of internal rules and the shipping calculator service.
During checkout, Retail Digital Commerce determines which externally priced shipping methods are available based on internal rules. The available shipping methods and costs are sent to the shipping calculator service in the request. The shipping calculator service responds with some or all of the available methods and their prices and these available shipping methods are displayed to the shopper with the returned price. Refer to Integrate with External Shipping Calculators and Use Webhooks for complete information on using this method.
- External shipping method - A shipping method returned by the external shipping calculator service that does not have an internal representation in the administration interface. The price and availability are determined entirely by the service. Refer to Integrate with External Shipping Calculatorsand Use Webhooks for complete information on using this method.
To create a new shipping method using the administration interface, follow these steps:
- Click the Settings icon, then select Shipping Methods.
- Click New Shipping Method.
- Select the type of shipping method that you want from the drop-down list.
- Enter the information that identifies the new shipping method. See the table that follows this procedure to learn about the information to enter in each field.
- Click Save.
The following table describes the properties that identify a shipping method.
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Display Name | (Required) A name for the shipping method. |
| Description | A short description of the shipping method. This does not appear on your store. |
| Internal Name | A string that is hidden from shoppers that lets you create multiple shipping methods with the same display name. The internal name makes it easier to manage shipping methods when working with shipping methods in the administration interface, for example, when viewing your list of shipping methods or creating shipping promotions. |
| Tax Code | A tax code to assign to the shipping method that allows your tax processor to make the appropriate tax calculations. For more information, see Configure Tax Processing. |
| Enabled |
Select the checkbox to make the method available on your store. By default, shipping methods are enabled. |
| Use as fallback shipping method | If your store integrates with external calculators for shipping services (such as UPS, USPS, or FedEx), you can specify internal shipping methods that will be offered to shoppers when Retail Digital Commerce cannot connect to external shipping service’s web service, for example, in the event of an outage. See Specify a fallback shipping method for more information. |
| Eligible for Products with Shipping Surcharge | Select the checkbox to make the method available to ship products that have shipping surcharges. |
| Sites |
If you run multiple sites within a single instance of Retail Digital Commerce, you can make a shipping method available to all sites or only to sites you specify. Select the Applies to All Sites checkbox if you want this shipping method to be available on all sites. If you want this shipping method to be available only on specific sites, uncheck the checkbox and select sites in the box below it. |
| Shipping Regions | (Required) The geographic regions for this shipping method. For more information, see Create Shipping Regions. |
| Price Groups | Select the price groups this shipping method applies to. If you leave this field blank, the shipping method applies to all price groups. |
| Shipping Charges |
(Required) Shipping charges are based on order cost. You specify one or more cost ranges and assign a shipping charge to each range. For example, order totals up to $50 cost $5.95 to ship, order totals from 50.01 to $74.99 cost $9.50 to ship, and order totals of $75 or more ship for free. Tip: To create a shipping method that provides the same shipping cost on all orders (for example, to offer free shipping), enter a Range Start value of 0.00, leave the Range End value blank, and then enter a shipping cost. Note: An externally priced shipping method can be created without specifying shipping charges, provided it is not a fallback shipping method.
|
Specify a Fallback Shipping Method
If your store integrates with calculators for shipping services, you can specify internal shipping methods that will be offered to shoppers when Retail Digital Commerce cannot connect to the external shipping service, for example, in the event of an outage.
The fallback shipping methods are displayed on the storefront during the checkout process. This prevents errors during order processing and allows orders to progress to the next step.
You can mark any number of shipping methods as fallbacks. You might want to create a fallback method for each type of shipping method you expected to receive back from the external shipping service.
Internally priced shipping methods marked as fallback are returned only if Retail Digital Commerce cannot connect to an external shipping service. Externally priced shipping methods marked as fallback are returned in both cases: The external price and availability are used if the service responds and internal prices are used if the service does not respond.
See Integrate with External Shipping Calculators for more information about configuring when Retail Digital Commerce uses a fallback shipping method.
Specify a Default Shipping Country
You can optionally specify a default country that automatically appears in the shipping address and appears at the top of the list of available shipping countries .during checkout.
The shopper can select a different shipping country.
To specify a default shipping country, follow these steps:
Configure Shipping Surcharges
You can apply additional shipping charges to products because of size, weight, or special handling requirements.
The surcharge is a fixed, monetary amount that applies to a specific product. For example, a kayak can have a shipping surcharge of $25, while a mattress, whose delivery includes removal of an old bed, might have a surcharge of $75. A product’s shipping surcharge is the same for each available shipping method.
Shipping surcharges are not affected by shipping promotions and are added to the order total during checkout, after discounts have been applied. For example, a shipping promotion offers free ground shipping on all orders over $200. A shopper purchases a $225 kayak with a $25 shipping surcharge. The order meets the free-shipping promotion condition, so the $30 ground shipping charge is removed, but the $25 shipping surcharge remains.
To configure shipping surcharges, follow these steps:
- Add the Shipping Surcharges property to the product types that you will use to create products that require surcharges. Shipping Surcharges is not a required property, so you can add it to a product type that you will use for other products. See Create and edit product types for information about adding properties to a product type.
- Add a shipping surcharge amount when you create or edit a product. You can add the surcharge manually in the administration interface or by importing product details. See Create and work with products for information about creating individual products in your catalog. See Import catalog items and inventory for information about importing new and updated products.
- Specify the shipping methods that are available for products that have shipping surcharges. See Create a shipping method for more information.
Understand Externally Priced Shipping Methods
Externally priced shipping methods can be created to represent each shipping method that can be returned by your shipping calculator service.
This allows you to take advantage of Retail Digital Commerce’s shipping promotion and tax calculation features.
Externally priced shipping methods are created in the administration interface and their price and availability are determined using a combination of internal rules and the shipping calculator service. During checkout, Retail Digital Commerce determines which externally priced shipping methods are available based on internal rules. The available shipping methods and costs are sent to the shipping calculator service in the request. The shipping calculator service responds with some or all of the available methods and their prices and these available shipping methods are displayed to the shopper with the returned price. Retail Digital Commerce applies shipping promotions and calculate taxes for externally priced shipping methods as it does for internally priced shipping methods. See Work with external shipping methods for more complete information on this subject.
You create an externally priced shipping method through the Shipping Methods page available from the Settings list. This is just like the existing internally priced shipping method except there is a selection in the dropdown list to indicate that it is externally priced. Since the externally priced shipping method is available in the administration interface in the same way as internally priced shipping methods, this also includes the “applies to shipping methods” picker in shipping promotions.
Externally priced shipping methods behave the same as internal shipping methods. Shipping promotions and taxes are applied to externally priced shipping methods the same way as they are to internal shipping methods. The store recognizes the shipping regions associated with externally priced shipping methods as it does internal shipping methods. The store should recognize the shipping regions associated with an externally priced shipping method that is considered unavailable based on internal rules but is returned by the shipping calculator. The service overrides the internal rules in this case and the resulting shipping method/storefront interface behaves the same as all other internal shipping methods. For more information about webhooks and the Shipping Calculator service, refer to Use Webhooks.
You can also select “fallback” shipping methods for an externally priced shipping method. Fallback shipping methods are displayed only if the shipping calculator service fails (or does not respond or responds improperly). This gives you the ability to still take orders if the shipping carrier service is having problems. Refer to Specify a fallback shipping method for more information on setting up fallback shipping methods. You can also refer to Integrate with External Shipping Calculators for more information about shipping calculators and about configuring when Retail Digital Commerce uses a fallback shipping method.
Note:
Externally priced shipping methods are supported in the administration interface and the Admin API. These methods are not supported in the Console. Merchants should not create externally priced shipping methods if they need to support the feature in the Console.Create an Externally Priced Shipping Method
To create a new externally priced shipping method in the administration interface, follow these steps:
- Click the Settings icon, then select Shipping Methods.
- Click New Shipping Method.
- Select Externally Priced from the drop-down list.
- Enter the information that identifies the new externally priced shipping method. See Create a shipping method to learn about the information to enter in each field. For more information on externally priced shipping methods and how they work differently from other shipping methods, refer to Integrate with External Shipping Calculators.
- Click Save.