Flat Rate Shipping & Special Delivery

[oldhasbeen]

Hi All

We use a flat rate shipping charge to all UK customers of £2.95 but also want to offer customers the option of paying extra for a guaranteed (Special) delivery service.

As we're not using weight based shipping, it's impossible to display the correct charge for guaranteed delivery (we have the same problem with international as well).

We're using a cobbled together solution at the moment which although it seems to work most of the time, is not ideal as it relies on customers reading the information given (which as we all know, they don't always!).

We've thought about using an "average" charge for both guaranteed and international, but there isn't really a happy medium - irregardless of order value, too high a charge for a light order will loose sales, too low a charge for a heavy order leaves us out of pocket (and with internationals you also have the issue of additional insurance for higher value orders).

My brain is totally exhausted on this - perhaps somebody else who uses flat rate shipping but also offers additional services could throw me a line - are we better off leaving it as it is, or have you found a happy medium on offering flat rate charges for guaranteed and international?

Thanks all - regards - Helen

[Kiran]

Hi Helen

As far as I can tell the system that are using at the moment seems to be the best possible solution. If you want specific charges to be associted with product then probably the best thing to do would be to assign weights to the products . But since you are using a flat rate I cannot see any other solution other then the customer choosing the shipping option. At most what you can do is to put some text on the checkout pages telling the cusotmer about the delivery options.