From Dokan Pro Version 3.2.4, customers can track your product with the new Dokan Shipping Status system. As you already know, Dokan has an amazing shipping system that vendors can use it to ship anywhere in the world.
However, users were demanding to bring in a feature that will help them track the product while being shipped. The new Shipping Status will let the users do exactly that. Check out how to set up and use the new Dokan Shipping Status feature.
Requirements, Enable WooCommerce Shipping
First of all you need to enable the WooCommerce shipping option from WooCommerce–> General–> Shipping Locations. You will find four options in the drop-down box. If you choose the ” Disable Shipping & Shipping Calculations” then Dokan Shipping Status won’t work.
Also, you will get a warning in the Dokan–> Settings–> Shipping Status to enable WooCommerce Shipping.
Note: If you choose to sell only Digital Products, then this feature will not work as well. (Go to Dokan → Settings → General → Selling Product Types)
Setup Dokan Shipping Status
Now that you have enabled WooCommerce shipping, you need to configure Shipping Status. Navigate to Dokan–> Settings–> Shipping Status. There Eenable “Allow shipment tracking service for vendors” and choose the 3rd party Shipping Providers which you want to enable for your vendors use.
Selected providers will set the tracking URL automatically and vendors only need to provide tracking numbers only. We have added quite a few options here. But if you don’t see your preferred one, you can choose Other vendors will be able to provide tracking URL manually. Please refer to the Vendor View Section for details.
- Allow Shipment Tracking Service: If you enable this option then vendors can use the Shipping Tracking feature.
- Shipping Providers: Choose the third party providers that the vendors can choose to provide shipping.
Note that: we didn’t implement any API for these providers. Vendors still need to enter tracking numbers manually and they’ve to update shipping status manually.
Choose the 3rd party Shipping Providers which you want to enable for your vendors to use. We have added quite a few options here. But if you don’t see your preferred one, you can choose Other and vendors will be able to provide tracking URL manually along with tracking number. Please refer to the Vendor View Section for details.
- Shipping Status: You can control what Shipping Status vendors can select while they add Shipping Status from this section. We’ve added quite a few shipping status. Vendors will only see status added here. They will not be able to add any custom shipping status from their end.
However, you can add any custom shipping status by clicking + (plus) button and remove any existing Shipping status by clicking x (cross) button.
Note that you cannot remove “Delivered” and “Cancelled” statuses. These two shipping statuses serve special purposes and as the name suggests, vendors will Select shipping status as Delivered when shipment is delivered to the customer and if vendors choose to cancel added shipment for any reason they’ll select shipping status as Cancelled.
You will find the detailed explanation for this under the Vendors View section.
Don’t forget to click the Save Changes button in order to save the changes you’ve made. That is how you can easily set up and track all your shipments using the Dokan Shipping Status feature.
Admin View
Admins can also the status of the shipments. But they have to see it from the backend. Navigate to WooCommerce–> Orders, there they will be able to see the shipment status on the Shipment tab.
Also, they can see the Shipment details as well by click on the order.
That is how you can easily setup and track all your shipments using the Dokan Shipping Status feature.
Note: in case a order has sub-orders, when the sub-orders are delivered the status will still show Partially until the main order is delivered.
Admin will not be able to add or edit any shipping status from backend.
How Vendors will Configure/Use Shipping Status
If Allow Shipment Tracking settings is checked/enabled from Dokan–> Settings–> Shipping Status ,vendors will be able to see a new column named Shipment added to Orders table here Vendor Dashboard–> Orders. This column tab will show the status of the shipment status of a particular order.
There are 4 types of shipment status,
- — : No shipment data is added for this order. Initially, all new and old orders will have this status.
- Not-shipped: When shipment data is added for an order but none of the shipment data is with the delivered state then the Shipment Status will be Not-Shipped. Note that canceled shipment status will not count.
- Partially Shipped: If there are multiple shipments (partial shipment) added for an order (say 4) and if any one of the shipment data has been delivered then the status will say Partially Shipped.
- Shipped: When all the product has been delivered to the customer.
Creating Shipping Status
Now we are going to add shipment status to the orders. Click on the View option that will give you the details of the order.
If you scroll down, you will see a Create New Shipment button. Click on it.
When you click the button, you will see a new tab will open where you need to put some details.
a. Order line items: In this section all line items will be displayed here. Here you can choose which ordered item (product) you are going to add shipment for. Click the checkbox of the item you want to add shipment.
A new text box will appear with a number of item counts for that item/product. If the number of item quantities is greater than 1, you can choose all item counts to be shipped at once or you can choose individual counts for a shipment.
Similarly, if the number of item/product count is greater than one, you can choose all the items by clicking the checkbox before each line item.
Note that: after you create a new shipment for your products, you will not be able to add or remove items or increase or decrease item counts. Though you will be able to change Shipping Status and Tracking Informations.
b. Shipping Status: Here you can add shipping status for, to be shipped items. Click Shipping Status Dropbox and select a status that reflects the current status of this shipment.
Note: you will be able to update this shipping status later after you add shipment information.
Note: Vendors will not be able to add any custom shipping status from here. Only admin has this option and admin will be able to add, update or remove shipping status from Dokan admin settings page. Please refer to the Setup Dokan Shipping Status section for more information.
Tracking Information:
a. Shipping Provider: Here you can select any predefined Shipping Provider or vendors will be able to add custom shipping provider by selecting Other from shipping Provider select box/dropdown.
If vendors select any predefined shipping provider, vendors only need to add a tracking number provided by that provider and the tracking URL will be generated automatically.
If vendors select Other from Shipping Provider select box, two new fields will appear named Provider Name and Tracking URL. Vendors need to provide these two fields along with the Tracking Number field.
Note: Admin will be able to add or remove default providers from Dokan admin settings panel. Please refer to the Setup Dokan Shipping Status section for more information.
b. Tracking Number: Vendor will get this data from the third party shipping provider they used to ship this order.
c. Comments: Here vendors can add any comments regarding this shipment and customers will be able to see this comment along with other shipment information.
d. Notify shipment details to the customer: If vendors check this checkbox, the customer will get an email notification after you add shipment data ie: after clicking the Create Shipment button.
e.Create Shipment: Click this button to add shipment information for this order
f. Cancel: Click this button to discard this tab.
Enter all the required information and click the Create New Shipment button. If data validation gets passed, a new shipment row will be added after a page reload.
You can view details of the shipment by clicking the down arrow head button.
Here you’ll also see a new section called Shipments Updates Timeline. All updates made for a particular shipment will be added here.
Update Shipment
If vendors want to update any Shipment information for a particular order you can do it also. Goto order details page for which you want to update shipment information. Just click on the “⌵” button of shipment item and you will get options to update shipment data.
Update what you need and click on the Update Shipment button to finish. Also, don’t forget to check the Notify the Customer checkbox if you want to notify customers about this update.
Note: Line items or line item quantity fields are not editable.
Cancel Shipment
To cancel a shipment, you need to select the Cancelled status from the dropdown box and hit the “Update Shipment” button. Also if you want, you can add a note explaining the reason for canceling this shipment. Customers will be able to see this message on their Shipment update details section.
Your shipment will be canceled.
Note: When an order is Cancelled/Refunded then the Shipment feature will be disabled.
Example
Suppose the customer has ordered 1 T-Shirt, that means you can click on the product name and ship it. If the customer has ordered 1 T-Shirt and 1 Pant, then you can choose ship them separately or together. You can create two New Shipment and use different shipping providers.
However, if the customer has ordered 11 T-shirts and 10 Pants, then you can choose the quantity you are going to ship in one shipment. You can send 5 T-shirts and 4 Pants in one shipment or 11 T-shirts in one shipment and 10 Pants in one shipment. However you like.
So, for your understanding we are going to show you the split shipment system. Our customer has ordered 11 Polo Shirts and 10 Long Sleeve Tee’s. We are going to send 7 Polo Shirts and 6 Long Sleeve Tee’s in one shipment.
After choosing the quantity, you need to select the shipping status from the dropdown box. Then select the Shipping Provider, Shipment date, Tracking number, and Comments if you want. Then hit the Create Shipment button to finish.
Note: You need to provide the right tracking number you got from the shipping provider. If the tracking number is wrong then you will get an error message.
You will see that the shipment is created. If you click on the tracking id then you can see the shipment’s status.
After the Shipment is created, vendors will see the status ” Not-Shipped” on their shipping tab.
When the shipment is delivered and the status is changed from Processing to Delivered in the order details section then the status of the Shipment tab will change.
Note: The reason the status is showing “Partially” is because we have shipped 7 Polo Shirts and 6 Long Sleeve Tee’s out of 11 and 10 respectively.
To ship the rest of the products go back to the Order details and click on Create New Shipment again to create another shipment.
When you create another shipment, you will see that the quantity is calculated automatically. There are 4 Polo Shirts (11-7=4) and 4 Long Sleeve Tee’s (10-6=4) left to deliver.
Add the shipping details like before and click on the Create Shipment button to finish.
And when you deliver the products, the status on the Shipment tab will change to Shipped.
That is how Vendors can easily create and track Dokan Shipping Status.
Customer View
However, the customer can also view the shipment details from their account. If the customer navigates to My Account–> Orders, they will be able to see the shipment tab and it’s status just like the vendor.
If the customer clicks on the View option, he/she will be able to see the shipment details.
If the vendor selects the “Notify Shipment Details to Customer” option while creating a shipment, then the customer will get an email that will contain the shipment details.
And when the shipping status is changed then the customer will also receive an email,
When the full order is delivered, then the status will change to Shipped.
This is how you can easily setup the Dokan Shipping Status feature.