How can I match FedEx shipping charges for manual dropshipping orders?

[badhairdude]

I'm in a situation where when people purchase from my site, I have to go to my dropshippers site and manual fulfill their order. They use FedEx.

On my site, I have flat rates depending on the $ amount, whereas my dropshipper's site has shipping by weight (the correct way).

This obviously is problematic if one orders a bunch of light items, driving up the cost but not the shipping weight. Or, if it's international vs domestic, flat rates are so very mismatched.

How do I go about matching what FedEx charges? Do I need to setup an account with FedEx and connect it to my shopify account if I never have the need to actually print labels? Any thoughts appreciated

EDIT: and if i connect FedEx, is the only plan that allows this is the $299 per month?

[Victor · Accepted solution]

Hi @badhairdude,

Thank you for getting in touch and for detailing your predicament. It can often be difficult to align your own shipping rates with those of your supplier's, but it's important to try and do so as best you can if your plan is to avoid losing money on shipping costs.

If your supplier is using FedEx rates, it might be worth adding the carrier-calculated shipping feature to your store so you can also enable live FedEx rates at checkout. As you mentioned, this feature is included as standard in our Advanced plan, but it can also be added onto other plans for an additional cost of $20 USD per month. It is also free to all merchants who pay for their subscription on an annual basis.

If you do choose to enable this feature and activate FedEx's rates on your checkout, you can offer the following FedEx shipping options to your customers:

• FedEx 2 Day
• FedEx Express Saver
• FedEx First Overnight
• FedEx Ground
• FedEx Priority Overnight
• FedEx Standard Overnight

You will want to check with your supplier and ask which shipping options they use, and can match these on your own site so your customers can only choose options your supplier uses too. It's also worth noting that you will need to create an account with FedEx in order to display their rates on your store's checkout.

If you'd be interested in activating the carrier-calculated shipping feature, or have any further questions, please let me know and I'd be happy to help you further.

Kind regards,

Victor | Shopify Social Care

[badhairdude]

Hi @Victor 

Yes, I would like to upgrade my plan to an annual basis if this includes carrier calculated shipping. Do I just change my billing cycle to yearly and then this feature will be unlocked?

[Victor]

Hi @badhairdude,

If you decide to switch from a monthly billing cycle to an annual one, you'll then just need to contact our support team and ask them to activate the feature for you. If you're having difficulties getting in touch, let me know here and I can move this conversation to email so I can help with this.

Please bear in mind when you switch to an annual plan, you are in effect paying for the year up front and will not be able to receive a refund if you cancel your store within the year. Along with the carrier-calculated shipping feature, you'll also receive a discount that equates to roughly 10% in comparison to paying for your subscription on a monthly basis for a year. If you can tell me which plan you are on, I'd be happy to tell you the cost of an annual subscription and the difference between that and paying for the store every month.

Kind regards,

Victor | Shopify Social Care