WAIT BEFORE “UPGRADING”! [REVISED]

  • Update 9/25/2024:

    v1.1.4 restores USPS live rates to those who lost them with the upgrade. This is a MAJOR fix. You have to keep the old Shipping & Tax plugin active, and I’m sure they will try again at some point to make us pay for this functionality, but this update does eliminate the need to pay $109 for the USPS extension. I processed my refund this morning.

    Address auto-validation is fixed. I have not yet had a chance to test this functionality, but this was one of the biggest usability headaches.

    Based on fixes in the last three updates and the devs’ responsiveness to making things right, I am upgrading my star rating to 3/5. If it weren’t for the headache that this migration has been, I might say 4/5.

    DEVS: Two issues remain! Fix these and you’ll have 5 stars from me, for whatever that’s worth:

    • BOX PACKING ALGORITHM: Shipping & Tax showed our packers what size box to use. We need this functionality back.
    • RE-PURCHASE LABELS FOR SAME ORDER: Again, this was an often-used feature of Shipping & Tax. It’s been disruptive to lose it.

    Update 9/19/2024:

    Several major bugs have been fixed in the two releases since this initial review. An issue with label data stored in the order meta has been fixed. A bug affecting orders with virtual products has been fixed. You now have the option to modify or delete package templates, but these settings are still buried within the label purchasing dialog (instead of in the shipping settings, where they clearly belong).

    The Woo team is trying to ease the pain of losing live rates at checkout by offering a free year of the USPS add-on. Honestly, I don’t think the team realized how many of us had this functionality, or what it would mean for us to unexpectedly lose it. They claim it was a deprecated feature, but I had it, and I didn’t start using Shipping & Tax until after they claim the feature was retired. . .

    Update 9/11/2024:

    The box packing algorithm has also been removed from this version. You are no longer told which pre-saved box is appropriate for the order.

    ——

    DO NOT upgrade from Shipping & Tax until you absolutely must. The Woo team needs time to make this right.

    I’m utterly confused as to how this plugin made it to production. Shipping & Tax was a feature-rich, fully functional extension with nearly a million active installs. How did the Woo team come to the conclusion that this version was ready, or that it should be marketed as an “upgrade”?

    TAKE NOTE: There is not a single new feature in the plugin that is not available in the latest version of Shipping & Tax, and many essential functions of the old version were removed without warning.

    • USPS rate quotes in cart/checkout are gone. You have to pay $109/year to get them back.
    • Usability is worse. The process of purchasing labels takes more clicks and more steps.
    • Many small, but essential features are removed. Specifically, the box-packing alogrithm, re-purchasing new labels for an order, auto-validation of addresses.
    • You are likely to encounter bugs. You will be forced to change your processes.

    Shop owners who upgrade without this warning will be left scrambling to revert, or deal with it. Betrayal of trust. ONE STAR.

    I’ll upgrade my star rating when this plugin truly resembles an upgrade.

    • This topic was modified 2 months, 1 week ago by grangep.
    • This topic was modified 2 months ago by grangep.
    • This topic was modified 1 month, 4 weeks ago by grangep.
Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
  • Plugin Author Gerhard Potgieter

    (@kloon)

    Hi @grangep, I am sorry to hear you are feeling this way around WooCommerce Shipping.

    I just wanted to clarify some things about WooCommerce Shipping for you, while I do not expect this to change your review immediately I do hope the changes we make will eventually persuade you to change this review.

    To start off, the intention of WooCommerce Shipping was not to be an upgrade at first to WooCommerce Shipping & Tax, otherwise we would have just pushed an update to that plugin.

    WooCommerce Shipping is a brand new shipping plugin build from the ground up, it was not copy and pasted and modified, we really spend a lot of effort and time into this plugin and went through a lot of research around order fulfillment and countless merchant interviews of existing WooCommerce Shipping & Tax users to come up with what we have. Yes, nobody is perfect, but feedback can help us get close to it so we rely on the feedback from the community to improve our product. We can also build a plugin for years, but getting it out to customers to use it is where we refine it to a great product based on the feedback, so I ask you to please be patient while we work through the feedback.

    Then I’d like to address your individual remarks around certain features:

    USPS rate quotes in cart/checkout are gone
    Live rates have not been part of WooCommerce Shipping & Tax for many years now, it was a trial we ran and that was eventually terminated in 2018 due to it not being sustainable and open to abuse. As a gesture of good faith we then kept access for the accounts that signed up initially. If you were one of those affected by this then I ask you please reach out to WooCommerce Support so we can find a solution to accommodate you while we evaluate a more sustainable live rates solution for WooCommerce Shipping.

    Usability is worse
    While we understand your frustration, the new interface and flow was done based on numerous research and merchant interviews of existing WooCommerce Shipping & Tax users. I did acknowledge that nobody is perfect so we value to the feedback and will make work to improve on this.

    Many small, but essential features are removed

    Re-purchasing new labels for an order – This was more of an oversight on the WooCommerce Shipping & Tax side, the button is actually greyed out but was not completely disabled. In a real fulfillment scenario doing this would mean you are altering stock without adjusting your stock levels, I would suggest you rather create a new order in wp-admin for shipping out replacement items and rather discount it 100%. We are also aware that there are use cases where a merchant do want to print once off labels so it is on our radar to add this ability in the future.

    Auto-validation of addresses – WooCommerce Shipping actually do not require you to have to validate an address to print a shipping label. You are able to purchase a label without validating the address, only when the carrier cannot find the address will we throw an error during label purchase and ask you as a merchant to intervene and validate the address. You will also be glad to hear that we have a validation at checkout feature that is very close to completion that when enabled will give your customer the ability at checkout to validate their address, this streamlining the label purchase process even more.

    modifying/deleting saved package templates – We are aware of this issue and are already working on a fix for this.

    Many bugs!

    We’d be happy to hear what these bug are and we will gladly make work on fixing them, again we can build the product as perfect as we think, but it needs to be used to find things that are overseen, not everybody’s site is the same so there are definitely things that we cannot account for in lab conditions.

    As a team we are really striving to make this product the best we can, but we rely on your feedback to make that happen, so thank again for your honest review and feedback, and hopefully we can get you to change this to a 5 star review very soon.

    Thread Starter grangep

    (@grangep)

    Thank you for your reply. I do hope for and expect the Woo team to get this right eventually. My complaint is focusing on two HUGE problems with this plugin: (1) It’s advertised as an “upgrade”, and (2) loss of functionality without proper warning.

    The emails that were sent to Shipping & Tax users specifically said:

    We’ve split WooCommerce Shipping & Tax into two dedicated extensions ready for their own spotlight — and they’re packed with new and improved ways to help your store perform.

    Upgrade to the new WooCommerce?Shipping today and we’ll carry over all of your settings and order history for seamless?use.

    There was nothing new, improved, or seamless about this upgrade. I advise users to wait as long as possible before switching to avoid as much chaos as you can. Eventually, you’ll have no choice—nut hopefully by then this version will better resemble what we had before.

    I’m sorry I upgraded just because the tracking numbers don’t link to the correct url. If I revert back to Shipping & Tax, will it go smoothly or will I have to reenter everything?

    Shaun Kuschel a11n

    (@shaunkuschel)

    Automattic Happiness Engineer

    Hey @signalhealth,

    I saw that you created your own thread for that question, which is very much appreciated. We will follow-up with you there shortly.

    Thanks!

    Plugin Author Gerhard Potgieter

    (@kloon)

    Hey @grangep

    Just a heads up that we implemented some more improvements in the latest release, version 1.1.4.

    Auto Address Validation: There is now a new and major improved auto address validation feature in WooCommerce Shipping. When creating a new label it will now automatically verify an address and mark it as verified, without the need for any user interaction. We are using brand new address validation and matching functionality in the background to achieve this and to ensure it is accurate. Only in rare cases where no matching address can be found will user interaction be needed.

    Usability is worse: You can now purchase a label with just a single click, if you have purchased a label previously it automatically remembers all your last selections and fetched rates upon opening the label purchase modal, and you just need to verify the details and click purchase label.

    Additional label purchases for an order: We are actively working on a solution for this so please keep an eye out in the next couple of releases.

    Hopefully this shows our dedication to ensuring all our users are happy and have a great experience using the product and would make you reconsider a higher rating now.

Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
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