WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers and Stamps.com

Hey @rrrrobb,

Thanks for reaching out to us about our plugin! I’m really sorry to hear about the frustrations you’ve had with integrating your Stamps.com plugin with Sequential Order Numbers.

It definitely sounds like the third-party Stamps.com integration your site is using doesn’t have full support for sequential order numbers and that this is causing some pretty serious issues.

I would recommend pointing the developers to our plugin’s page which offers some tips to developers on how to add compatibility for customized order numbers:

https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/woocommerce-sequential-order-numbers/

They may also want to have a look directly at our code repository:

https://github.com/skyverge/woocommerce-sequential-order-numbers

If the developers aren’t successful in making the plugin compatible or you’d like to give another plugin a try, I would highly recommend trying out the official WooCommerce Stamps.com API plugin found at the following link:

https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-shipping-stamps/

Please keep in mind that WooCommerce.com does offer full refunds within 30 days of purchase, so if you would like to take WooCommerce Stamps.com API for a test run, feel free to do so! I would highly recommend utilizing this to give the plugin a try and make sure if will work well for your business.

I hope that’s helpful and thanks again for using our plugin! Could I help you with any other questions?

Cheers,

Tamara

Thank you for your response. It has become quite apparent that the problem is that Stamps.com is only retaining one number for a given order.

If the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin is installed and active:
Stamps.com, via their “Plugin Name: WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration”, collects the “Order Number” created by the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin.

If the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin is NOT active:
Stamps.com, via their “Plugin Name: WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration”, collects the “Order ID” created by the WooCommerce installation.

When Stamps.com processes ones information it is based upon which ever number it has. If one is NOT using the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin the entire process works because the “Order ID” is correct.

However if the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin IS active the process breaks because the Stamps.com system tries to use the “Order Number” as the “Order ID” and this is not correct.

From what we have been told, what we are trying to do should work. That we should not have to use the Pro versions of either plugin in order to achieve our end results. That it is/was intended to work.

We would pay for and use both Pro versions of the plugin’s if we had use of the functions which make them the Pro versions. However we have no need and no intention to use these Pro features. All we need and desire is the basic functionality which we have been assured should work. We have a hard time paying approximately $120 (per year) for the Pro versions that we are not supposed to need in order to do what we have been told we should be able to do for FREE.

It is becoming a principal thing. Why pay money for something that should be working for FREE. If it is supposed to work using the FREE version then they should make it work.

Otherwise they should openly admit that it costs $120 per year to do what we are supposed to be able to do for FREE.

What keeps happening is:
We call in, tell them what is happening, what we are trying to do.
Then we are told we should be able to do what we are trying to do, that it should work using the FREE versions, that someone will contact us.
Then no one contacts us. Not a peep. No emails, no phone calls. Silence.

The errors generated by WooCommerce actually show the “Order Number”=“Order ID”. On the orders created using the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin. It is blatantly obvious that the system is not working correctly. They need to fix their problem. The users should not have to pay an additional $120 per year to make something work that is supposed to work for FREE.

I appreciate that the Pro versions may work. But if we have no need for the additional functions that make it a Pro version we shouldn’t have to pay to make the FREE functions work.

Put Simply, Stamps.com needs to fix their interface to recognize the fact that the “Order ID” and the “Order Number” aren’t necessarily the same number.

Thank you again for your response, hopefully it will not fall on their def ears.

I just got off the phone with another customer service rep from Stamps.com who is claiming this is not a bug it is a feature request.

First
Plugin Name: “WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration”
is provided to Stamps.com customers via their two interfaces. Either the web interface or the Windows app interface.

Second
This “Plugin Name: WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration” has been written to acquire the “Order Number” created by the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin.

Third
When “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin is activated This “Plugin Name: WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration” gathers the “Order Number” provide by the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin and uses it for the “Order ID”.

Fourth
When the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin is active, generally, the “Order Number” and the “Order ID” are not equal.

Fifth
If the “Order Number” and the “Order ID” are not equal and one tries to use the “Order Number” as the “Order ID” the system creates a “fatal-error”.

Sixth
If the code for the “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin was not present in the “WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration” plugin provided by Stamps.com it would not acquire the “Order Number” in the first place, it would acquire the “Order ID”, and would always work.

Seventh and Finally
This is not a feature request, this is a partial implementation that is causing “fatal-errors” and the possibility of the wrong shipping information being passed on to the wrong customer. If the order number of one customers order matches the Order ID of another customers order the wrong information could potentially be passed.

The code for acquiring the “Order Number” created with “WooCommerce Sequential Order Numbers” plugin is clearly inside the code of the “WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration” plugin provided by Stamps.com. If you look at the code you can clearly see it is implemented to acquire the “Order ID” and it does. It just isn’t fully implemented correctly. Because it tries to use that same “Order Number” as both the “Order Number” (correct) and the “Order ID” (incorrect – causes the fatal-errors).

Hey @rrrrobb,

I’m sorry to hear about your continued frustrations with these compatibility issues.

I can assure you that the Sequential Order Numbers Pro plugin will not be needed if your organization doesn’t need its pro features. This is because the Stamps.com integration you are currently using will have the same compatibility problems with any plugin which alters the order numbers in any way.

Our team develops and supports the two Sequntual Order Numbers plugins and I’m afraid that we can’t be of much help with the functionality of the Stamps.com plugin your site is currently using. We can only recommend that you try the official WooCommerce plugin as mentioned in my reply above.

If you would prefer to stick with the free plugin you are currently using, then compatibility with plugins that alter order numbers will need to be added by the developers who develop and support that plugin. If you’d like, I’d be happy to reach out to them directly to offer some tips.

However, I’m afraid I couldn’t find any contact information for “StampscomEndicia”. Could you share which website you downloaded the plugin from or an email address I can use to reach the developers directly?

Thank you,

Tamara

• This reply was modified 5 years, 2 months ago by SkyVerge.

Hello,

I’d be happy to share the link. The file is offered directly from Stamps.com. When Stamps.com customers add WooCommerce as a source they are presented with a link to this plugin. So sense Stamps.com is presenting this plugin, for FREE when the customer adds WooCommerce to their account, I would beg to differ that it is the Official plugin “stampscomendicia“. The other is a Pro or third party upgrade.

Hey @rrrrobb,

I hope you had a great weekend!

I apologize for the confusion about the “official” terminology, I can definitely see how it can be confusing when Stamps.com is offering this plugin.

In my case, “official” was simply referring to “listed on the WooCommerce.com” marketplace – SkyVerge works closely with other developers listing on the WooCommerce.com marketplace to ensure plugins are compatible wherever possible and are working well together even if full compatibility isn’t achievable. Our team had previously worked closely with the WooCommerce to ensure their Stamps.com API offering supports plugins which alter order numbers such as our two Sequential Order Numbers plugins and is our recommended Stamps.com integration for your needs.

I’ve had a look through the plugin you’ve provided and I can see that Stamps.com is listed as the author here. As such, in order to use this plugin along with any plugins which alter the order number, you’ll have to ask their team to work on adding compatibility with plugins which alter the order number. The developers will likely find the following section of our documentation helpful to determine how to add compatibility and if it’s something their team can introduce:

https://docs.woocommerce.com/document/sequential-order-numbers/#faq-compatibility

I’m sorry I couldn’t be of more help here but I hope that this is helpful nonetheless. Could you please keep us in the loop on what Stamps.com decides to do with respect to adding compatibility on their end?

Thanks,

Tamara

Hello Tamara,

So far Stamps.com’s position is “sense this is related to a third party plugin”, this is a “Feature Request” not a “bug”. Thus they have no time to do anything about it.

Funny, it is their code that has the problem in it. It is their code that causes the “fatal-error”. It is their code that is reading the “Order Number” created by “Sequential Order Numbers” and incorrectly uses it in place of the “Order ID”. If their plugin wasn’t written to use the “Sequential Order Numbers – Order Number” it would simply use the “Order ID” and work.

But somehow this is a “Feature Request” not a “bug”.

Currently we have reached out to WooCommerce and asked them to verify that the Pro Plugins work together correctly and don’t have this same issue. We have waited all week for their response. We finally got it, but they didn’t bother to understand the question before they gave us a canned response. So I have again responded to them, again requesting them to verify that the Pro plugins actually work correctly. We need to install this on two different sites and the cost becomes more than $200.00 to do this. We do not want to waist any more time and money before we know that the plugins actually work.

So here we are another week later, and still no answer.

Hey @rrrrobb,

I hope you had a great weekend! I’m sorry to hear that this is still unresolved on your end and wish I could do more to help.

Based on my review of the WooCommerce Stamps.com API plugin I don’t believe you will see the same issues as you do with the current plugin but I wasn’t able to test it as I don’t have a Stamps.com account.

I just wanted to mention again that the Pro version of Sequential Order Numbers shouldn’t be required for your needs and you can continue using this free version.
I’d recommend utilizing the 30-day refund policy and only purchasing the WooCommerce Stamps.com API plugin to try it out with Sequential Order Numbers on your site.

As such, if you run into similar issues in your testing you can contact WooCommerce to refund your purchase immediately no questions asked ??

I hope that’s helpful! Please do keep me in the loop once you’re able to test with the Stamps.com API plugin.

Cheers,

Tamara

Hello Tamara,

We purchased both the “WooCommerce Stamps.com API” and the “Sequential Order Numbers Pro” plugins and gave them a test.

However we determined that the function of the “WooCommerce Stamps.com API” plugin was not for us. We aren’t looking to handle the postage printing from within our individual Woocommerce sites. Having more than one source of orders we prefer to use the Stamps.com interface to manage our shipping labels. It simply makes it more efficient.

We have found the need for “Sequential Order Numbers Pro”.

I am not sure why…. but after testing…. using the FREE version of the Woocommerce plugin (Plugin Name: “WooCommerce – StampscomEndicia Integration”) supplied by Stamps.com and the payed plugin “Sequential Order Numbers Pro”, everything seems to finally be working.

I know there have been updates to plugins and WordPress. I don’t believe any of those updates were specifically related to this issue or these plugins. I can say at this time that we are finally functioning correctly. I do not know if the free version “Sequential Order Numbers” is working. I am hesitant to try it now that I finally have the site functioning.

Thanks again for all of your help.

Take care.

Hey @rrrrobb,

Thanks so much for the followup! I’m glad to hear that things worked out with Sequential Order Numbers Pro. It does include a lot of additional behind-the-scenes functionality to build-in things like searching and ordering by order numbers. It’s definitely possible that one of these added hooks were all that was needed to adjust compatibility with your Stamps.com plugin.

Thanks again!

Tamara