Postcode UK delivery

[chipshi11]

Hi, I can't seem to find what I'm looking for after hours of searching so hopefully someone can point me in the right direction.

 

Basically I run a furniture shop, which just sells sofas, chairs etc. I usually do the deliveries myself for £30 in the local area (Liverpool), but have found a courier who will ship suites to anywhere in mainland UK for £80 so I can now sell online.

 

All I need is a module that will check the first part of a customers postcode, if it's a Liverpool postcode, delivery is £30, if not, then it's £80. In my head it doesn't seem difficult but all the zones and postcode add ons I can find are based on weight, which link to companies for prices. I don't want weight to be involved, they are all around the same weight and my charge is per order, regardless of what they buy.

 

Is there something like this out there or am I thinking it's a lot easier than it actually is?

 

Any advice would be appreciated as most of the site is ready to go other than this and payment methods now.

 

Many thanks

 

Chris

[burt]

I don't recall seeing a delivery module that can deal with postcodes like this. Can anyone else chip in any known addons that can handle UK postcodes ?

[piernas]

You may define two zones for UK in location/taxes -> zones. There are already zones (regions, states...) defined for some countries but not for the UK.

[chipshi11]

I've already set up (I think) 2 zones amongst the hundreds of others for the UK, basically one within Liverpool and one outside. No idea how the system is supposed to know to check the first part against a list of UK postcodes from somewhere though?

[MrPhil]

Add-ons http://addons.oscommerce.com/info/7845 and http://addons.oscommerce.com/info/6165 might be a good starting point. They'll probably need some work to fit them into 2.3.4. What it sounds like is that you want zoned shipping with a flat rate within a zone: Liverpool local and rest of (mainland) UK. It doesn't sound like it's currently available, but you should be able to bend some combination of zone and flat rate modules to do the job.

[Mort-lemur]

@@chipshi11 There are no postcode addons for UK that I am aware of.

 

I would personally handle this with MGZMT shipping add on.

 

Set one zone to liverpool with a weight range of 1 - 10000Kg and set the price as £30

 

Set the second zone to all the other counties - same weight range but with price of £80

 

Mind you dont het caught with surcharges for Highlands and NI

[chipshi11]

@@Mort-lemur What is a MGZMT add on? I can't find anything resembling that in a search on the add on section?

[piernas]

Once you set up all the zones your new customers will have to choose one from the list of zones you have set up instead of typing one. You may have to change existing customer's addresses with phpmyadmin to reflect the zones in the zones table.

 

Then you add two geo zones, one local and the other for the rest of the UK. And then two shipping modules (both fixed rate) and point each of them to a geo zone.

 

I think this should work without addons... It works for Spain, Germany, US and other countries already added to the osc database. I'm not sure if the UK zones are not in the database because they are not officialy defined or because nobody coded them into oscommerce. But that's a function that already works on oscommerce from the begining.

[chipshi11]

Ahh ok. There only one customer at the minute, me! But I didn't know it would give a drop box when you sign up so I'll delete that customer and start a new one with the zones in place and get back to you :)

[chipshi11]

@@piernas Ok I thought I was getting there with all this but apparently not :(

 

Once you set up all the zones your new customers will have to choose one from the list of zones you have set up instead of typing one. You may have to change existing customer's addresses with phpmyadmin to reflect the zones in the zones table.

 

I've added two zones in admin/locations/zones: country - united kingdom, zones - 'outside liverpool', code - 'mainland' (and the second one has zones 'inside liverpool' and the code is 'liverpool'. When registering a new customer, there's no option to choose one of these though?

 

 

Then you add two geo zones, one local and the other for the rest of the UK. And then two shipping modules (both fixed rate) and point each of them to a geo zone.

 

Where are these added? I also can't figure out how to add a second flat rate module...

 

Sorry about all the questions, but I appreciate it, I didn't think it would be this difficult

[burt]

You cannot use zones in that way, easily. Zones are for counties; lancashire, worcestershire and such.

 

You need a shipping module that can detect;

 

a ) in the UK

b ) has a postcode beginning with L(n)

 

a = yes, b = yes: £30

a = yes, b = no: £80

 

a = no: ?

 

There is no such shipping module available at the moment as far as I can see (did a very quick search at the addons area).

Edited February 18, 2015 by burt

[Mort-lemur]

I think you may be restricted to using counties as your shipping zones rather than postcodes.

 

The mod I mentioned earlier is here: http://addons.oscommerce.com/info/8136 (use the kymation version)

but would also need you to add all the UK counties

 

Then you could have:

 

Zone 1: Liverpool

Zone 2: Other UK Counties

Zone 3: Highlands & Islands

Zone 4: Northern Ireland

 

And set the appropriate shipping prices for each

[piernas]

I'm sorry @@chipshi11, I don't know well how UK is divided for postal service and if it will work well as for Spain.

 

I've tested something similar and the drop down menu is not visible at first when you choose a country, but if the zone selected does not match the zones on the database oscommerce will throw an error and show the drop down. I must have added the option to show the dropdown as the country is selected as an addon, and will probably need some javascript.

 

If you still consider it useful I'll tale a look and try to find if it is an addon or it was a hack I made.

 

What version of oscommerce are you using?

[piernas]

@@Mort-lemur I'm curious; I've seen the aadon you have posted and I don't see the diference with the standard osc behavior. Can you explain what it does different?

[Mort-lemur]

its main purpose is to allow several shipping methods per zone, with an unlimited number of zones

 

eg Mainland UK: Royal Mail, or 24 Hour Courier or 48 Hour Courier etc

[Mort-lemur]

as per this - this is the set up for one of my zones:

 

 

[piernas]

Oh I understand - I use several shipping modules instead one.

[chipshi11]

I think you may be restricted to using counties as your shipping zones rather than postcodes.

 

The mod I mentioned earlier is here: http://addons.oscommerce.com/info/8136 (use the kymation version)

but would also need you to add all the UK counties

 

Then you could have:

 

Zone 1: Liverpool

Zone 2: Other UK Counties

Zone 3: Highlands & Islands

Zone 4: Northern Ireland

 

And set the appropriate shipping prices for each

I've installed this now so I shall give it a go and get back to you :)

Would them zones you mentioned be instead of where I have included the Within Liverpool and Outside Liverpool zones?

 

 

What version of oscommerce are you using?

2.3.4

[chipshi11]

Also, while I'm setting this up I might as well ask. As my shipping cost is a flat rate regardless of weight, am I right that the shipping table would just read Geo Zone 1 Shipping Table 1 = 5:30? All of my stock has a default weight of 1, and geo zone 1 will be Liverpool, so it would be £30... Does that look right?

[chipshi11]

I've changed it slightly in the table so zone 1 is 4:30,6:60 so if there's 5-6 piece it would cost £60 instead. Same for the zone 2 which is the rest of mainland but I still can't find anywhere at checkout or creating a customer account where it asks which zone you are in in order to calculate it :(

[Mort-lemur]

@@chipshi11 Hi chris

 

First you need to install the UK counties as per:

 

 

 

Then add the counties to the shipping zones as per:

 

 

Edited February 19, 2015 by Mort-lemur

[MrPhil]

Does he need something more specific than a list of counties ("states")? I think at some point the postal code ("zip code") will have to be examined to override the zone figured from county/state. That's probably custom code to extend the shipping zone function. It would be "by default (county) the zone is mainland UK, but being in this list of postal codes overrides to be Liverpool local delivery".

[Mort-lemur]

He could define zone one as Local Delivery with counties set as Liverpool and perhaps merseyside

 

zone two would be National Delivery rest of uk counties minus those in zone one and three

 

Zone three could be Highlands and Islands - Containing counties in the scottish highlands and islands

[burt]

It makes more sense to programmatically lookup the postcode, see if matches Liverpool and display relevant shipping options (X in Liverpool, Y outside).

[Mort-lemur]

Unless the postcode is outside Liverpool - on the Shetland Islands or in Northern Ireland..........