Topic 8 – Part 5: Shipping Methods

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In order to help store owner easily ship products to customers after they purchase in Shopping cart site, Magento offers Shipping caculation platform to add more shipping methods. Thus, to complete the checkout process on a store, I think it is also necessary to understand Magento calculate shipping well. Let’s read my artilce today for more details!

Related post: Top 10 best Magento shipping extensions 2018

1. Magento calculate shipping rates

Magento calculates Shipping rate throught the Insance Model of each shipping method. So, shipping method is checked whether to be active or not. It will be estimated the fee by collectRates() of Instance model. You could follow one typicle example with module Mage_Shipping_Model_Carrier_Tablerate. You can see the collectRates() method:

/**
* Enter description here...
*
* @param Mage_Shipping_Model_Rate_Request $data
* @return Mage_Shipping_Model_Rate_Result
*/
public function collectRates(Mage_Shipping_Model_Rate_Request $request)
{
if (!$this->getConfigFlag('active')) {
return false;
}

// exclude Virtual products price from Package value if pre-configured
if (!$this->getConfigFlag('include_virtual_price') && $request->getAllItems()) {
foreach ($request->getAllItems() as $item) {
if ($item->getParentItem()) {
continue;
}
if ($item->getHasChildren() && $item->isShipSeparately()) {
foreach ($item->getChildren() as $child) {
if ($child->getProduct()->isVirtual()) {
$request->setPackageValue($request->getPackageValue() - $child->getBaseRowTotal());
}
}
} elseif ($item->getProduct()->isVirtual()) {
$request->setPackageValue($request->getPackageValue() - $item->getBaseRowTotal());
}
}
}

// Free shipping by qty
$freeQty = 0;
if ($request->getAllItems()) {
foreach ($request->getAllItems() as $item) {
if ($item->getProduct()->isVirtual() || $item->getParentItem()) {
continue;
}

if ($item->getHasChildren() && $item->isShipSeparately()) {
foreach ($item->getChildren() as $child) {
if ($child->getFreeShipping() && !$child->getProduct()->isVirtual()) {
$freeQty += $item->getQty() * ($child->getQty() - (is_numeric($child->getFreeShipping()) ? $child->getFreeShipping() : 0));
}
}
} elseif ($item->getFreeShipping()) {
$freeQty += ($item->getQty() - (is_numeric($item->getFreeShipping()) ? $item->getFreeShipping() : 0));
}
}
}

if (!$request->getConditionName()) {
$request->setConditionName($this->getConfigData('condition_name') ? $this->getConfigData('condition_name') : $this->_default_condition_name);
}

// Package weight and qty free shipping
$oldWeight = $request->getPackageWeight();
$oldQty = $request->getPackageQty();

$request->setPackageWeight($request->getFreeMethodWeight());
$request->setPackageQty($oldQty - $freeQty);

$result = Mage::getModel('shipping/rate_result');
$rate = $this->getRate($request);

$request->setPackageWeight($oldWeight);
$request->setPackageQty($oldQty);

if (!empty($rate) && $rate['price'] >= 0) {
$method = Mage::getModel('shipping/rate_result_method');

$method->setCarrier('tablerate');
$method->setCarrierTitle($this->getConfigData('title'));

$method->setMethod('bestway');
$method->setMethodTitle($this->getConfigData('name'));

if ($request->getFreeShipping() === true || ($request->getPackageQty() == $freeQty)) {
$shippingPrice = 0;
} else {
$shippingPrice = $this->getFinalPriceWithHandlingFee($rate['price']);
}

$method->setPrice($shippingPrice);
$method->setCost($rate['cost']);

$result->append($method);
}

return $result;
}

The table rate method calculates shipping rates based on the combination of several conditions. The rate is upon Weight vs. Destination, Price vs. Destination, or # of Items vs. Destination (site admin can configurate for that). The method above gets configuration and rate data from database to calculate.

2. Add custom shipping method rates

To add new shipping method to Magento system, you need to follow 2 steps. At first, you need to add configuration for your method (config.xml):

...

<[CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE]>
1

[CUSTOM_MODULE]/carrier_[SHIPPING_MODEL]
100
250
[CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE]
0
US
1
Sorry! We don't support in this country.
<!--&#91;CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE&#93;-->

And if you want to show configuration for admin to edit, add the file system.xml:

<[CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE] translate="label" module="shipping">
<label>New Shipping Method!</label>
text
13
1
1
1

<label>Enabled</label>
select
adminhtml/system_config_source_yesno
1
1
1
1

&lt;br /&gt; &lt;label&gt;Title&lt;/label&gt;&lt;br /&gt; &lt;frontend_type&gt;text&lt;/frontend_type&gt;&lt;br /&gt; &lt;sort_order&gt;2&lt;/sort_order&gt;&lt;br /&gt; &lt;show_in_default&gt;1&lt;/show_in_default&gt;&lt;br /&gt; &lt;show_in_website&gt;1&lt;/show_in_website&gt;&lt;br /&gt; &lt;show_in_store&gt;1&lt;/show_in_store&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
...

<label>Shipping title</label>
text
5
1
1
1

<label>Shipping code</label>
text
6
1
1
1

<label>Ship to applicable countries</label>
select
adminhtml/system_config_source_shipping_allspecificcountries
90
1
1
1

<label>Ship to Specific countries</label>
multiselect
adminhtml/system_config_source_country
91
1
1
1

<label>Show method if not applicable</label>
select
adminhtml/system_config_source_yesno
92
1
1
1

<label>Show method if not applicable</label>
textarea
99
1
1
1

<!--&#91;CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE&#93;-->

Secondly, you need to write the model carrier for your shipping method. In this model please write two methods (collectRates and getAllowedMethods):

class [FULL_CUSTOM_MODULE]_Model_Carrier_[SHIPPING_MODEL]
extends Mage_Shipping_Model_Carrier_Abstract
implements Mage_Shipping_Model_Carrier_Interface
{
protected $_code = '[CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE]';

public function collectRates(Mage_Shipping_Model_Rate_Request $request) {
if (!$this->getConfigFlag('active')) {
return false;
}

$result = Mage::getModel('shipping/rate_result');

$method = Mage::getModel('shipping/rate_result_method');

$method->setCarrier('freeshipping');
$method->setCarrierTitle($this->getConfigData('title'));

$method->setMethod('freeshipping');
$method->setMethodTitle($this->getConfigData('name'));

/** Custom shipping method rate calculation and set for method */
$method->setPrice('1.00');
$method->setCost('1.00');

$result->append($method);
return $result;
}

public function getAllowedMethods() {
return array('[CUSTOM_SHIPPING_CODE]'=>$this->getConfigData('name'));
}
}

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