doreck Posted November 30, 2006 Posted November 30, 2006 After many many hours, I'm reaching the conclusion that OSC is largely incapable of selling downloadable items along with physical items. I have physical products that must have a "handling charge" added to them (because I'm charged a handling charge by my supplier), and there seems no way to avoid having that handling charge, or some sort of shipping charge, tacked on to downloadable items as well. I've tried all the shipping modules, and there's no way around it. The "workaround" of setting shipping weight of downloadable items to 0 simply won't work for my store. And I'm guessing my situation is not at all unique. If developers read these threads, it would seem to me that downloadable items should completely bypass the shipping module. As it is, each of the shipping methods impacts the downloadable items in one way or another, which leaves me out of luck. It appears that I will need to set up a complete separate sales channel for my e-books. Or start from scratch with another shopping cart program... Signed, frustrated
abra123cadabra Posted November 30, 2006 Posted November 30, 2006 What happens if you set the weight of downloadable products to zero and adjust your shipping module to trigger only for weights other than zero? abra The First Law of E-Commerce: If the user can't find the product, the user can't buy the product. Feedback and suggestions on my shop welcome. Note: My advice is based on my own experience or on something I read in these forums. No guarantee it'll work for you! Make sure that you always BACKUP the database and the files you are going to change so that you can rollback to a working version if things go wrong.
doreck Posted November 30, 2006 Author Posted November 30, 2006 What happens if you set the weight of downloadable products to zero and adjust your shipping module to trigger only for weights other than zero?I don't know how to set the shipping module to do that, abra. As it is, all methods of shipping add the handling charge no matter what the settings are regarding weight. Dear developers -- think about it: the whole beauty of downloadable sales is that there are no shipping or handling charges. It would be preferable if the customer wouldn't see anything relating to shipping and handling in their checkout window when purchasing a downloadable item. Don't you think? ~Doug
doreck Posted November 30, 2006 Author Posted November 30, 2006 Should this thread have been titled "Download function completely useless?" After my post last night, I decided to try the workaround of manually adding my handling charge to the per pound charge using the "table" shipping mode. I then set "shipping and handling" to zero, and thought I'd be okay. But lo and behold, the 1 pound shipping charge is being added to my downloadable product, even though its weight is set to zero. Of course this is a free program, and so I realize I need to temper my expressions of "extreme frustration." Perhaps no one is using this feature? Or is there some sort of glitch or bug that I can somehow work around? It seems that last night the program was adding the shipping and handling charge to downloads, but was not adding a per pound charge. But now that I've removed the shipping and handling charge, it has started charging the 1 pound rate. Nothing else was changed, so it appears to be some sort of bug. I tried adding a "0" pound setting in the shipping table, but this didn't help. I'm stumped -- and very disappointed... Any clues? TIA! Doug
doreck Posted November 30, 2006 Author Posted November 30, 2006 It seems that last night the program was adding the shipping and handling charge to downloads, but was not adding a per pound charge. But now that I've removed the shipping and handling charge, it has started charging the 1 pound rate. Nothing else was changed, so it appears to be some sort of bug.Combing through my configuration settings, I saw that I'd set a number in "Tare package weight". I changed that to zero, and voilà, my downloadable product shipping charge disappeared. A number added in "Tare package weight" is added to the weight of any package, so my downloadable item listed as 0 pounds was no longer 0 pounds. So that is yet another feature rendered unusable when one wants to sell downloadable products. Dear developers -- I do hope you'll take note of this problem. Your program would be much improved if downloadable items were completely exempted from any and all shipping calculations! (And your users would be spared a lot of grief :wacko: )
doreck Posted December 1, 2006 Author Posted December 1, 2006 OK, so having successfully cleared the shipping charge hurdle, I placed a test order, selecting the option to pay by check or money order, and the order went through successfully. Now what? :-" I'm searching high and low, and there's no place to initiate a download. None.
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