Different courier rates for different states

[Barry]

Hi folks

I have a site where we want to only deliver to 3 or 4 countries, to different areas within that country. The products are very heavy and are sent by courier so we need to set different rates for different areas within each country. Then as we expand into different countries, we can add a new country and states within that as we go.

I understand how to set up 'states' within each country, but how can I set different rates/ prices for each of these states? I cant for the life of me figure out where that can be done.

Any ideas anyone? Is this perhaps not the best way to do this? There is a warnming not to delete any countries unless you are "absolutely sure" you wont need them in future. We cant be sure of that but need to delete the ones we dont currently deliver too. Am i creating future problems by deleting countries?

Any comments much appreciated

Thanks guys

[leehack]

When you create a shipping zone (inbuilt help should help guide you on those), you can right click on it and select the countries (states in your instance) for that zone. So you could have:

UK
- Scotland
- Wales
- Ireland

Then create a shipping zone, and choose to add the relevant zones to it, then add your shipping classes (inbuilt help again) to provide the shipping services for that zone. Think about how you name your classes as you can use them across lots of zones, so instead of scotland next day for example, just use next day etc.

Be careful on your PSP too make sure SD and your PSP can cope with states for multiple countries, Sagepay as i understand is only setup for UK and USA.

[Barry]

Thanks Lee

I first went to 'Settings> Locations' and entered some new States in the UK Country.

Then, I go to the Shipping Zones table and in the Zones/Class configuration window I select UK but I cant see the states anywhere so Im unable to set a higher price for Scotland than Wales for example.

Even if i delete all the shipping classes and re-add them I still have nowhere that i can set different prices for different states

Am i misunderstanding something?

Thank you!

[leehack]

You have to right click on the zone and add the countries/states that you want on that, not on the class.

[Barry]

Thanks Lee

Sorry, i think i am not explaining myself very well
I have right clicked on the zone and added the UK (which i have already added the states to. )

Now if i right click on 'UK' and got to properties, I see the UK in the left hand window with a plus sign next to it, when i click the plus sign i see the list of states. So all looks well so far.

But, I cant see anywhere that i can set the price of delivery to these states, i can only set the price of delivery to the uk

Any ideas? and thanks for your help so far!

[leehack]

Don't add the UK as that will include all of the states within it too, instead on the right hand side expand the UK group and select just the states that you want in that zone and move just them. Sounds like you are treating the UK as a whole, go down to state level instead. You will probably need to uninclude the UK before you can do this.

[Barry]

Thanks Lee

I tried that. I even deleted teh UK zone entirely, apllied and OK'd it and then started again. I tried to add just the Scotland State, but it added the UK 'mother' then when i tried to add Wales, it added it as a 'child' of the UK

Those 2 states were then not selectable anywhere in order to set rates for that state. It was exactly the same as before when i tried it the other way.

Strange one this eh? Has anyone else ever set different delivery rates for different states? I would have thought that would have been quite common especially in the US wher they have different laws, different taxes and of course huge differences in distances between the states.

[Barry]

If you open up your copy of SD and try to change rates for the states within the US you will see what i mean. There isnt anywhere that you can select the states and set a different delivery charge.

Hmmmmm.........

[peblaco]

See the inbuilt Help menu > Help Topics. Search for Shipping and there are many tutorials there which would be worth a careful read. Including "How do I charge a group of countries/states in the same way for shipping?". It seems you have got as far as creating a new zone and adding a location but have not then added a class to the zone to set the charges.

[Barry]

Hi Peblaco, thanks for replying

I have set up many sites and am familiar with the shipping set up when you are only setting different rates for different countries.

My problem is that i want to set different rates for different states within those countries.

If i set up a country with states within it in the 'locations' section. That all seems great until i come to defining what the price is to deliver to that state. As far as i can determine it cant be done.

The only way i can see to do it is to set up a different shipping zone for each state. But i guess that will look messy in the checkout as customers will see only a list of states from various contries. I would like to have a country drop down list that then loads the relevant states once that country is selected (like the US and Canada options currently do) with each state having a different price for courier delivery.

Can this be done? It looks like no t cant but surely im missing something?

Are you able to set differnt prices to deliver to the different US states for example? I cant see how to do that as the states are not selectable in the shippin Zone Configuration window

[Barry]

Hi peblaco

Aghhh! I'm having a senior moment i think! I just cat see how to do this, thanks for bearing with me!

a) If I set up states as seperate shipping zones, then I wont get the country drop down choice which loads the states. All sates will be in one big list
B) If I set up the locations as countries with states as child items, then I get the country drop down AND the states drop down, but, I then cant set different prices for those different states as only the country is selectable as a shipping zone

Another way to put problem B); there is nowhere i can see where i can select one of the US states and set deliver rates for that state, as only countries can be selected as shipping zones and given a shippin value

if you see what i mean

please help, this is one of those that just drive you nuts and keep you awake at night!

[peblaco]

The states only appear after you select the country. See the Help topic regarding zones and classes.

[Barry]

Thanks peblaco, what you said makes sense and I think i might be on to the problem at last!

I set up some states within the UK country, these states appear in a seperate drop down after you select UK as your delivery country. But, the US and Canada ststes do not appear when you select those countries. Neither do the states that I just set up under France when you select France

This would seem to be a bottleneck of the problem. Thanks for the tip, im looking into this now and will post back what happens

Phewee!

[leehack]

Make sure that your tax rules are setup and match the shipping zones, each country you setup must have tax and shipping rules in order to show and work properly. Because you are setting specific countries/states up, make sure the none of the above is not an option and you set it so that you do not ship to locations not set up.

I have very recently setup dummy countries for the UK to cater for different costs of service, so i can confirm it does work on UK. I have a suspicion that you cannot setup states on any country unless SD changed this and also you need to be very wary of tax codes on your multiple locations because you will run into tax code issues when people come to use the checkout.