The parts of shipping
- Shipping categories say what a product is for delivery: parcel, oversize, chilled. A product has one, and its variants use it. Products without one use the default shipping category from the Shipping settings.
- Groups: every shipping method belongs to a group, with a name and an identifier.
- Shipping methods create the delivery options. Each has a name, an Active switch, its group, the shipping categories it carries, the warehouses it serves for pickup, and template code that decides where it delivers and what it charges.
- Rates are the options a shopper chooses from: a name, a price, and optionally a service level and a courier. A rate lasts an hour (the rate Lifetime setting).
Methods are written by a developer
A method's template code runs when shipping is worked out for a checkout, and creates one rate for each option it offers, typically priced by the parcel's weight and the delivery country. Editors look after the rest: which categories a product is in, its weight, and which methods are active. Weights have no unit, so agree one (kilograms, say) and enter every product's weight in it.
A store that sells only downloads still needs a method: one that offers a free rate for every address, because a checkout cannot be paid without a selected rate.
Shipments and tracking
Once an order is placed, each fulfilment's parcels are recorded as shipments, with the courier's tracking code and link. See Inventory and fulfilment.
When no delivery options appear
- No active method carries the product's shipping category.
- The method's code creates no rate for that address: the country is not one it serves, or the address is incomplete.
- A product has no weight where the method prices by weight.
- The method's code stopped with an error, which creates no rates: pass the address and the products to your developer.
Developers: Shipping methods and their templates in the commerce guide.