Freight questions

[niko]

I am getting way too many emails from customers asking how much is the freight to a particular location. This is due to the fact that the customer doesn't see the freight charges until he has to go deeper into the bowls of ordering. It is so irritating having a program that continues to have updates that surely can include freight and total charges before having to take a number of steps into the purchasing process.

David, I don't think you understand the importance of this issue and tend to concentrate on irrelevant updates. I am still unhappy with the changes you made to when entering a new product; that being the tabbing effect. I don't recall anyone asking for that change and it causes me more pain than gain.

The trend is, I suspect that version 4 will not fix these serious issues and considering the internet has come along way since I purchased this software, it is becoming less feature rich than other programs on the net for todays customers needs.

[bcarroll]

I dont know how this physically can be done any better - ie you need to know the post code and the order contents to even think about doing any fancy freight quotes and how do you gain this before the cart process?

To make it easy on yourself and your customers why dont you just offer flat rate freight - sure on some orders you will may be subsadising the freight a little -but these are likely the orders you really want (ie big $) and may actually get you the sale in the first place.

Else make a static page listing indicative freight pricing.

[niko]

A simple postcode box should be sufficient as a "quote freight" in the shopping cart based on someone adding a product to cart. It may work on a similar principle to updating cart as you update quantities on the fly.

[dferguson]

We have checked out some of our competition in this regards as its an often asked question.

Here are the facts.

You CANNOT quote freight until you know what country the customer is in and IF its Australia you need to know either what state they are in OR what postcode they are in.
(depending on the freight method used you need different information!)

The only way you could attempt to quote freight on the cart page is if you offer flat rate postage WORLDWIDE. Otherwise you would at LEAST need to ask what country they are in.

Our competitors:

Shopfactory:
Shopfactory is one of our biggest competitors. They simply dodge the freight problem by asking the uber honest customer how much freight they want to pay. It doesnt seem to compare the customers chosen freight method/price to where the customer says they are located - This has the unfortunate potential for the merchant to recieve orders with incorrect frieght amounts added to the order because of a dishonest customer or simply because most customers dont bother to read anything and will pick the cheapest option even if its not a suitible freight method/price for their order and location.

OSCommerce:
This is a powerful open source package with many features but is a LOT harder to setup and maintain than an ezimerchant site.
To place an order on a site built with oscommerce you must first be a member - Which is a tedious task but only needs to be done once.
When adding products to the cart the freight price is NOT shown even if your logged in. You need to proceed to the checkout before the site will quote you your freight options. Now, because you have already logged in at this point it is able to quote you freight options without asking for your address - a good feature.

What we are doing about it:

ezimerchant Pro currently does not have log in features - so we are working on this. This will allow the customer to check their freight price after proceeding to the checkout and logging in. If the customer already has a log in then they wont need to retype their address each time to check the freight price as we will be able to calculate freight because we will know their destination.

[barbara]

I just want to add my two cents... We are calculating postage based on weight (within Australia), for example if you buy under 500 grams it costs $4.50 for postage and handling. What I would love to see is an extra bit at the shopping cart page, stating the total weight and, if under 500grams, the postage cost would be $4.50, if 500grams to 3kgs it would be XX and so on and so forth. Of course there would need to be somewhere to state that this is only for Australian orders, for international orders postage will be calculated at checkout. But if there was something like this, with the most standard postage being displayed, I think it would be a vast improvement

[extralite]

I do have the same problem and was wondering how other did it.

We charge a flat rate for Australia and for Overseas.

For Australian orders it works great. Easy. I don't mind if we lose a few dollars on the large orders.

For overseas orders it is a problem. An item to New Zealand is half that to Europe. So the New Zealand customers are upset at the high freight, and we lose money posting to Europe. Hmm.

Overseas packages are charged according to 4 zones. New Zealand, Asia, US and the Rest of the Workd. I don't suppose it is possible to incorporate those easily.

[dtoots1]

Kinda curious as to what method of shipping is being involved? Looks like is mostly postage in Aus but other methods beyond?

Just wonder how large of shipments involved and how is the motor freight calculated down under?

I am in USA and not familiar with overseas. We charge here on what is known as freight classification and mileage or distance and rail is basically the same type of operation.

Any info or questions ? Can direct e-mail @dtoots1@neo.rr.com

thanks

[aromaguy]

I don't know if this helps but on our website we offer a default freight of $9 for Australian orders with a clear message on a freight tab indicating freight will be manually reduced to $5 if the weight is under 500grams and any weight over 3kg will be increased accordingly.
We also indicate that a follow up e-mail will be sent advising of freight changes being made.
We find that in most cases $9 is correct and can use Australia Post Satchels.
It's not the best of methods but it seems to work for us.
:)
John for Bonvale Creations.
www.bonvalecreations.com.au

[ZingZangs]

I use a flat rate for local and Australia Wide then I have a different flat rate for NZ & USA.

And I have this posted on my home page.

A lot of people that I spoke in regards to "When they prefer to know the freight, either on my home page or when their at the check out?"

Most said that they prefer to know even before they start shopping, because they have been hit with very heavy freight fees once they at the checkout.

Personally, I prefer to know straight up.

Having your freight on your home page could mean one of two things.

1. Potential customers will see that your not hiding your freight charges and they will shop at your online store.

or

2. They will see it and go else where.


I think it really does come down to each individual....ask around and find out what it is that other people prefer. That way then you will have more of an idea as where to display your freight charges.

PS: I do realise that this is not an option for everyone.