Shipping settings are being handled by Shopify, except they're not.

[SteamWarehouse]

I've read a few posts on this in the community, but nothing seems to help, so I'm going to describe the problem and hopefully someone has a solution.

We are a plumbing supply company and we have products like gaskets that can way an ounce, and we have pumps that can weigh 50lbs. We have thousands of SKUs and ship all over the USA and Canada (we're based in Canada) and we can't just build a custom table for each product or weight, as we have too many SKUs and it's not manageable. 

When I'm in Merchant Center, it says the following: Shipping settings are being handled by Shopify

But inside of products, I get this message: Missing or incorrect shipping costs Prevents from showing in Canada and United States Add shipping costs for your product. Shipping cost currency must match the product price currency.

I ran a quick test and if I add a blanket visible free shipping policy, products will appear, but when I turn off visibility the products get denied again. I obviously can't quote free shipping as we can't ship a 50lb pump across the continent on us.

The question is two fold, how do I get GMC to recognize the Shopify shipping, and if it can't, how to get listed without creating thousands of product specific tables that need to be maintained? 

Appreciate the help.

[beauxbreaux]

Hello,

In your Shopify Shipping and Delivery settings, what do you currently have set up? (screenshots help)

For something like what you are describing, a good setup would probably be to create 2 zones. 1 for USA and 1 for Canada. Then in each zone set up automatic shipping rates based weight and service type. You can also achieve this through conditionals grouping weights by common shipping prices. So for example like this:

This is an example of a setup using both conditional and service rates by weight with 2 zones (of course yours would look a different because I am located in the USA:

You may already have all of this set up the way you want it but let me know what you currently have set up so we can go from there and walk through the steps you need to take to achieve what you need. 

[SteamWarehouse]

Hi Beaux and thanks for trying to help here.

Since I'm using Shopify, it seems to have defaulted to the following (displaying Canada for reference, USA is the same):

Based on that, it doesn't seem like it's weight based. Are you saying I should change the defaults?

Thanks

Olivier

[beauxbreaux]

Your settings do look correct. How you can double check is by clicking the 3 dots then edit rate.

Now look to see if it says this:

If you see that, then you do have the settings set up correctly. One other option it to try an manually set up the rates in google merchant center opposed to the sync method.

To turn off automatic sync:

-In Shopify dashboard go to Apps and type Google and click the Google & Youtube app

-Next in the menu bar where it says Overview, Products, etc... Click settings

-Scroll down to Shipping Settings and click the manage button

Here you can turn on or turn off the sync. You can then go on google and set up the shipping settings with their tool. This way if there is a syncing issue it wont be a problem as the information is entered manually. 

Where these settings are updated in google merchant center is under the Shipping and returns section. It should give you the option now to edit the settings. Pay close attention to the country Column and the currency that it is using. 

I am not entirely sure what the exact problem is and am just giving you advice on what I would try. 

[SteamWarehouse]

Again, thanks Beaux, yeah, everything you pointed out looks right. Here's the screenshot:

Manually setting up shipping is going to be impossible as we have way too many products and product sizes and without upmarking all the shipping rates, and thus pricing us outside of competitors. Let's see if someone else has run into this issue, and maybe they have a creative solution. Any which way, you've been amazing, so thank you for your help!

[EmmanuelFlossie]

The issue is that if the shipping settings are too complex, albeit it might be simple to you, the google and youtube app will not be able to match the shipping settings.

The second problem is that because you are using this app, you will not be able to setup shipping settings manually. 

Your second problem is that custom products are not really supported in Google Shopping, and as such, not knowing the product weight is not an outcome supported by Google, unless you specify a specific shipping rate.

So one, I want to caution you for submitting products that are not finished, as Google expects goods to be in it's finished form before listing it on the website. However there are situations you can keep some products not in stock, if for example you keep the most popular products / variations in stock, and the not so popular products not in stock, as explained here: https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/7162856?hl=en

Now for the shipping issue, that you can't edit, I recommend you use the following app for your data feed: https://apps.shopify.com/multiple-google-shopping-feeds

Then you can setup a fixed shipping rate, that is equal or greater then what you charge in the checkout.

[SteamWarehouse]

Hi Emmanuel,

Thanks for the response. I'd actually come across your video organically! I'd actually taken your recommendations by moving to the classic merchant center, and then added shipping policies, but set them all at Free and turned off the visibility. Here's what's interesting, before I turned off the visibility, my products were live, but as soon as I turned off the visibility, Google once again took my products offline.

Creating shipping policies when we have hundreds of products that are different shapes and sizes and we ship to multiple countries is not practical and very cumbersome. I've submitted the feedback as you suggested, but I'm really at a loss here.

Also, I heard you say you've never had a chance to deal with something like this in a live environment, I'm more than happy to let you take a look under the hood if you'd like.

Thanks again for your suggestions.

Olivier

[EmmanuelFlossie]

Hello Olivier, yes I would love to have a look at the setup feel free to reach out to me.

Regarding switching the visibility to off, not sure I understand where you do this, or why. Google will only be able to show published, live, active products.

[g_lowndes]

Hi Olivier, 

Did you end up finding a solution? I'm having the same issue with my store that only sells to New Zealand customers and I can't figure it out. 

Thanks,

Gareth