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Shipping Rules FAQ

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ShippingEasy Content Team

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Also known as mapping, Shipping Rules allow you to automate order processing within ShippingEasy. This saves you time and effort. Learn how to create a Shipping Rule.

We have a comprehensive list of our favorite Shipping Rules with step-by-step instructions - view the Best of Shipping Rules to get started - or read through the FAQs on this page to discover all the ways you can customize Shipping Rules to your needs.

Just a few examples of how "Shipping Rules" can be used:

  • If you know that all incoming orders that have a status of Awaiting Payment should be assigned to a particular category, you can define a shipping rule so that ShippingEasy will do that assignment automatically.

  • If all orders that have a specific Requested Service will eventually be shipped using one of your shipping presets, define a shipping rule to make that assignment happen automatically.

An order popup is available on the ORDERS, BATCHING, and SHIPMENT HISTORY screens that list all Shipping Rules that were applied to the order.

Order details showing shipping rules applied and marked

Can I use Shipping Rules if I enable Branded Emails?

If you have created specific templates that you want your customers to receive via these rules, we recommend not enabling Branded Emails.

Shipping rules that contain the actions:

"set shipment notice template" and/or "set delivery notice template"

will be overridden by enabling Branded Emails.

For all other Shipping Rules, enabling Branded Emails has no effect.

How do I use Conditions to target specific orders with a Shipping Rule?

Understanding Conditions

You specify one or more conditions, each of which is checked against every incoming order. If all of the conditions for a shipping rule exist for an order, then that shipping rule is applied to that order. If any of the conditions do not exist, then the shipping rule is not applied to that order.

An example of two conditions:

Rule IF statement showing 2 actions

If an order has a status of Awaiting Payment and the total weight is less than or equal to 13 ounces, then this shipping rule will be applied to the order.

Available Conditions

  • All SKUs

  • Alternate order number

  • Any SKUs

  • Custom Field 1

  • Custom Field 2

  • Custom Field 3

  • Customer is a first-time buyer

  • Customer Status

  • Customer tags

  • Destination

  • Destination type

  • Destination state

  • Destination country

  • Item Name

  • Item SKU

  • Number of line items

  • Order is Amazon Prime

  • Order is gift

  • Order month

  • Order number

  • Order reference ID

  • Order status

  • Order tags

  • Order total

  • Order weight

  • Product category

  • Product description

  • Product has low stock

  • Requested service

  • Sales channel

  • SKU tags

  • Store

  • Total expanded quantity

  • Total quantity

  • Zone

Limitations of Conditions

Up to 6 conditions can be specified in each Shipping Rule.

Conditions with Multiple Selections

Some shipping rule conditions contain more than one selection.

Here is an example with two selections:

Rules 2 conditions, awaiting shipment and partially shipped

If an order has a status of Awaiting Shipment - OR - Partially Shipped, then this shipping rule will be applied to the order.

How do I control what Actions a Shipping Rule applies to the order?

Understanding Actions

Shipping Rules use Actions to make changes to qualifying orders. The Actions are just things that ShippingEasy does for you.

Here is an example of two actions:

then rule showing set saved carrier selection and set from address

For every order that meets the conditions of this rule, ShippingEasy will set its shipping preset to Large Envelope Flat and will set a specific Stored Address when that order is shipped.

Available Actions

  • Add customer tags

  • Add order tags

  • Add to order weight

  • Assign to a category

  • Assign to a user

  • Break out and split by SKU

  • Clear the order

  • Create a pay-on-use return label for outbound shipment

  • Remove order tags

  • Set confirmation option

  • Set delivery notice template

  • Set estimated order weight

  • Set order weight

  • Set final packing slip template

  • Set packing slip template

  • Set shipping preset

  • Set saved recipient billing

  • Set saved third-party billing

  • Set ship from address

  • Set shipment insurance based on Specified Amount

  • Set shipment insurance based on Order Total

  • Set shipment notice template

  • Split all line items

Limitations of Actions

You can specify up to 6 actions in each Shipping Rule.

How do I automatically create a shipment or purchase a shipping label?

After the list of actions, there are options for creating a shipment or purchasing a shipping label.

Rule option to automatically send Orders to Order Page

The default (shown here) is to just send the order to the ORDERS page - no shipment is created automatically.

The option, "Purchase and print label", not only creates a shipment but will also purchase the shipping label and print the label. This is ShippingEasy's InstantLabel feature.

The shipping label can only be purchased if you have used a shipping rule to assign valid shipping preset to the order. If the assigned printer for the carrier is PDF, then the shipping label will be on the READY TO PRINT page. If the assigned printer for the carrier is a ConnectEasy printer, then the label will be sent to the printer.

Some customers will see a Drop Ship option. This displays only if you have enabled at least one Amazon store in the account to have Multi-Channel Fulfillment.

Are the rules applied after a shipment is created?

No. If a Shipping Rule has the option checked to create a shipment for each order that meets the conditions of the rule and an order meets all the conditions of that Shipping Rule, then no subsequent Shipping Rules are applied to that order. If there are multiple Shipping Rules that you want to apply to each order, just set the create a shipment option on the last Shipping Rule in the list.

Why do I not see one of my store's requested services listed on the conditions list?

The list of requested services derives from the orders that you have loaded into ShippingEasy. After an order comes in with that requested service specified, you will see it listed as an option when defining a Shipping Rule.

If I use a rule to apply a shipping preset, can I batch my shipments?

Yes. If all of the orders within a batch have the same shipping preset assigned by a Shipping Rule, then that shipping preset will be used on the BATCHING page.  However, if even just one order in the batch didn't qualify for the rule, then the default shipping preset will be assigned on the BATCHING page. Learn more about the best way to apply Shipping Presets to a batch using Shipping Rules.

What does it mean to set the estimated weight?

There is a shipping rule action for setting an order's weight to an estimated value.

Rules then action to set order weight

This action sets the weight of the order based on past orders that contained the same product(s). For more information, see our FAQ guide explaining how estimated order weight works.

Can I apply packing slips in overlapping shipping rules?

No. Once a packing slip template has been applied with one rule, that assignment cannot be overridden with a subsequent rule. It's best to narrowly define the conditions when assigning packing slips.

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