[ic] Canadian shipping woes.

Fri May 3 09:42:00 2002

Has anyone got shipping from Canada working with anything other than straight flat rate or formula
based methods?
(IC 4.8.3, out "of the box" or 4.6.5 for that matter)

I am no shipping guru, but I have put together shipping for several of my US base clients including
setting up new methods using web lookups (UPS), zone chart & rate tables (USPS specific no less) as
well as custom weight/price based methods.

Now I'm trying to set up a Canadian based store with e.g. "UPS Standard" (~equivalent to "UPS
Ground").
I downloaded an applicable zone chart for the origin postal code from UPS.ca and edited it to
conform.
(sampling below)
Destination,Early Am,Express,Xpr Saver,Expedited,Standard
A0A - A9Z,711,411,511,311,211

B0A - B2T,711,411,511,311,211

B2V - B3Z,709,409,509,309,209

B4A - B9Z,711,411,511,311,211

C0A - C0Z,-,411,511,311,211

C1A - C1E,-,410,510,310,210

C1G - C9Z,-,411,511,311,211

E0A - E0Z,-,411,511,311,211

E1A - E1G,709,409,509,309,209

E1H - E2G,711,411,511,311,211

E2H - E2S,709,409,509,309,209

etc.

I downloaded the rate chart for the method from UPS.ca and edited to conform.

(sampling below)
Exceeds,Kg,200,201,202,203,204,205,206,207,208,209,210,211,212

1,,8.05,13.15,13.25,13.3,15.65,16.85,16.95,17.15,18.15,19.7,21.35,21.4,21.55

2,1,8.05,13.15,13.25,13.9,17.2,19.2,19.25,19.35,19.75,19.85,21.6,21.65,21.8

3,,8.05,13.15,13.25,14.2,18.7,19.65,19.7,19.75,19.8,20.55,21.9,21.95,22.2

4,2,8.05,13.15,13.25,14.5,19.7,20.8,20.85,20.9,20.95,21,22.5,22.55,22.85

5,,8.05,13.15,13.25,14.8,20.2,21.3,21.35,21.4,21.45,21.5,22.85,22.9,22.95

etc.

I uploaded/installed the files.

I created the new method including all necessary db setup stuff as per the usual procedure.
I called the zone file 550.csv just to get IC to swallow.
I called the Ratechart "DomStd.csv" and it comes up clean as a table in the UI and the associated
database file are clearly generated (gdbm, numeric, autonumber).
The newly defined method has shipping.asc enties as follows:
UPSDOMSTD Standard weight 0 0 e Nothing to ship! {'ui_ship_type' => "UPSI",'PriceDivide' =>
"1",'origin' => "L1N9R6",'ups' => "1",'table' => "DomStd",'geo' => "zip",'zone' => "550",'at_least'
=> "5",}

UPSDOMSTD Standard weight 0 150 u {'PriceDivide' => "1",}

UPSDOMSTD Standard weight 150 9999999 e Too heavy for UPS {'PriceDivide' => "1",}

Here are some observations:
I am supposed to be able to call the zone chart whatever I want so long as I define it in the
catalog.cfg
Well, it wont show up in the admin shipping dropdowns unless the name conforms to the nnn.csv
convention (3 digit numeric name).
So if I want to call my file L1G.csv because that is the chart covering the postalcode range which
I'm in, it wont even show up.
Similarly, on the checkout page I can't get anything to show up in the "Shipping Method" dropdown
box.
(Although the defined methods show up on the account.html page when viewing a user account;
buggy???) and I get something like "No match found for mode 'default', quantity '', returning 0."

If I try to use a US based method such as "UPS Ground Commercial", I still don't get the dropdown
box but the message GNDCOM: Origin postal code must have five digits appears (fair enough; I hve a
canadian postal code defined)

BTW, why do I need to see the message "GNDCOM: Missing ConsigneePostalCode" when I first hit the
checkout page (not loged in)?

And: Why does IC insist on changing ownership of shipping.asc (interch:interch) everytime it updates
a method when I thought I had everything set up to run in interch:catuser (U) mode??

I have tried everything I can think of to make this work (without hacking any code) but my
conclusion is that IC can not handle Canadian internal zone/rate lookup shipping or for that matter
web based lookups. That postal code of ours seems to thow it.

If I keep everything strictly "US" flavored, everything works fine.

Pleeeease correct me if I'm wrong.

Bruno Cantieni

###########################################
Bruno Cantieni
Digital Landscape - Cyboretum.com
Web Applications * Web Hosting * e-Commerce
http://www.digi-land.com
http://www.cyboretum.com
bruno@digi-land.com
Phone/Fax: 905.668.2255