Local Pick up option not tied to inventory at a location

JenMDoss
Excursionist
22 0 11

Hello, Our business is 99% local delivery and local pick up. We mostly deliver directly to customers, but every week we have a group of orders that we pack up and drop off at another local business for our customers to pick up there. I'd love to use the local pick up feature, but when I try to set this other local business as a location, it wants me to also have inventory there. Since all orders are fulfilled at our one main location, it doesn't make sense and would be a huge pain to try and manage inventory at the pick up location.

 

I know that I can set the pick up location as a free flat rate in shipping rates, but it shows up first in a list of delivery options because it's free and many people don't pay attention and select it thinking all our delivery options are free. As we add other similar pick up locations, I'd love to be able to add them in the local pick up feature. 

 

Is there any way to have local pick up locations that are separate from inventory since all inventory is managed at our one main location?

Replies 10 (10)

minna
Visitor
1 0 3

I have the same issue. I'm e-commerce only and offer local pick up with a friend's boutique where they can pick up. I can't possibly add inventory to another location when it's not managed at that location. I also can't add the inventory to a second location which means messing around with my inventory online.

 

I also have local pick up as a shipping zone but the bigger reason I want the local pick up option is for the targeted notifications. I have to manually email all customers with the notification that their order has been dropped off, instead of fulfilling the order and sending them an automatic shipped email. 

 

Hoping others have this issue too and we can get it worked on.

 

 

Photo_Brown
Tourist
4 0 3

What I found works.

If you  set inventory to be Available at all locations, Set Inventory level to Zero at 2 and click keep selling when inventory is sold out on the product.   All your Locations will be available for Delivery or Pick up.     You just have to be careful to not oversell if the product has a limited quanity.  

JenMDoss
Excursionist
22 0 11

Thank you for the reply and suggestion. Allowing things to be oversold would likely create issues for us that might not be worth the benefit, but it's good to know there is a potential work around. Ideally Shopify would change this so that a location could simply be listed as a pick up location and not tied to inventory at all. 

Photo_Brown
Tourist
4 0 3

Absolutely,  I have sent a few messages and suggestions about not tying the inventory to Pick up or Delivery locations.    So far I didn't get ahead with it.    

Because Delivery and Pickup are tied into Inventory, we are also running into issues with our Fee App.    The App adds a Fee as a New Product at checkout, however the Fee is only added to the Default location, and listed as not available at the additional locations ( As a safety measure to make sure it doesn't add the Fee multiple times).   What happens is the Products that requires the additional fees are therefore only Available for Pick up at the Default Location and delivery available within 20km from the default location.   It worked great during testing with the single location, so we paid the lifetime fee for the App and because so we prefer to keep using the app.   We have contacted both the App designer and Shopify service for possible round about ways, and got nowhere. 

In the end,  if Inventory is not a factor in both pick up or Delivery locations,  It would cure a lot of headaches from our end.   It would make the apps correct, and we can keep our inventory more accurate, and be able to sell more one offs.   

Tristan10
Tourist
4 0 0

I would second adding that feature to shopify. With this pandemic, this is a now a common way to deal with efficient deliveries while social distancing.

MargueriteJ
Excursionist
14 0 9

I also would like this feature - we stock over 4,000 different SKU's. That's too many products to watch if they go out of stock and change the "keep selling when out of stock" feature. We have a VERY kind merchant in a town 60 miles away that has offered to be a pickup location for us, and another business that has offered to transport the orders up there for us. It's perfect - except there's no way for us to do it in Shopify. Would any third party apps offer this functionality? 

Photo_Brown
Tourist
4 0 3

We are experiencing abandoned carts due to not having the option to pick up at the location they are closest to.    We have to follow up with a return message to contact us if Pick up or Delivery is not available for their desired location.  We have recovered a number of orders through by doing so.  

What we have discovered in the Back end is that there is no way to change the Pick Up location.   So when the automated messages go out for ready to be picked up it will list the wrong location, so Once again we will follow up with an email stating the Proper Pickup location.  


nataliegard
Visitor
1 0 1

Was there ever a resolution to this?  It is so frustrating.  Every time we sponsor an event and allow people to pre-order and pick up at that event, it makes me create a new location, transfer inventory there so it actually pops up as an option for pickup and then wants me to register to pay taxes in that state.  It just doesn't make sense.....would love some help on this! 

Photo_Brown
Tourist
4 0 3

I have never been notified.   Last I heard they where looking into it, however that is going on 3 years now.   

We have it so there is a message to make a note upon checkout if pick up is not an option at their preferred location.    If there is an abandoned cart we have a similar message.  However it is not ideal.    Especially with larger items, that need to be picked up at a location.    

I wish it was set up to view as a Complex, and cure this issue. 

Also the other thing we noticed.  If an order is split between 2 locations, auto fright calculation will increase the freight fees - ie shipping cost from 2 locations instead of shipping from one.  We have internal delivery systems between locations, so we we can transfer in the same day, and no need to have extra shipping costs.  We often refund if it is an outrageous amount that the customer paid. 

softerandrea
Tourist
5 0 0

Just replying to say this is a feature we're looking for as well. As an online store without an actual retail storefront, the ability to show pick-up locations at stores that aren't physically our own, (or at events, as suggested above), would be really helpful.