Learn how to assign a carrier to an order and how to configure automation rules to automatically assign your preferred carrier(s) based on order properties
Assigning a carrier to an order
Every order needs a carrier assigned to it for shipping. In ShipStation, there are two ways to assign a carrier to an order:
- Select a carrier/service directly in ShipStation from the available carriers in the "Configure Shipment" section of an order,
- Or simply add a Tag to the order that specifies which carrier to use.
Important notes:
- Ideally only one of these methods is used, but if it so happens that an order has both a selected carrier and a carrier tag, then the selected carrier takes precedence.
- If more than one carrier tag is added to an order, then no carrier will be selected because the system cannot determine which carrier is preferred.
- If your desired carrier does not already exist in the list of available order tags, then please contact ShipCalm Support to add the missing carrier tag.
- If you are unsure of which carrier to choose, we recommend using Marvin Shops™ to rate shop across all our carriers and automatically select the best option for you (see below).
Automatically assigning carriers using automation rules
ShipStation automation rules can be configured to automatically assign a carrier or a carrier tag to orders as they import. Automation rules can be configured based on a large variety of order specific properties and are capable of performing many actions once an order is matched against the properties specified. For a general introduction to automation rules, please refer to ShipStation's Guide.
For assigning carriers, it is most common to use either the "Requested Service (Marketplace Value)" field or a "Custom Field" that contains tags set by the shopping cart or originating order source. For example, the following automation rule sets a specific carrier whenever the requested shipping service is "Free Shipping":
For additional support or to request a review of your automation rules, please contact ShipCalm Support.
Leveraging Marvin Shops™ for the best rates
Often the best choice is to not select a specific carrier at all, but instead let ShipCalm's helpful robot Marvin make a selection for you after rate shopping an order across all our available carrier options. To take advantage of Marvin Shops™ you must ensure that
- all SKUs in Infoplus have accurate length, width, height and weight recorded in the Item table, and
- your desired packaging has been reviewed and configured.
These data are required for Marvin to retrieve accurate freight quotes. Once these data are verified, we can configure Marvin Shops™ to find the cheapest shipping costs subject to maximum transit time constraints like "use the cheapest carrier/service available that will still deliver this package within 3 days." If you are interesting in leveraging Marvin Shops™ then please review your SKU data and ask your ShipCalm Head of Ops to assist you with the configuration.