Shipping Policies in Odoo 18
Shipping policies are essential components of an e-commerce or retail business managed through Odoo 18. They define how products are shipped to customers, ensuring clarity in operations, cost management, and customer satisfaction. Below, we explore the shipping policies and their configurations in Odoo 18.
1. Overview of Shipping Policies in Odoo 18
Shipping policies in Odoo are designed to:
Automate the shipping process.
Allow configuration of delivery methods.
Support integration with shipping carriers.
Offer flexible options for calculating shipping costs.
2. Key Features
1. Delivery Methods:
Define various delivery methods such as standard shipping, express delivery, or specific carriers.
Configure shipping costs based on fixed rates or rules.
2. Carrier Integration:
Integrate with third-party shipping carriers like FedEx, UPS, DHL, or USPS.
Automate label printing and tracking numbers.
3. Shipping Costs and Rules:
Calculate shipping costs dynamically based on weight, volume, or destination.
Offer free shipping for orders exceeding a predefined threshold.
4 Real-Time Rates:
Fetch live shipping rates from carriers.
Allow customers to choose their preferred shipping option during checkout.
5. Multi-Warehouse Support:
Manage shipping from multiple warehouses.
Optimize delivery routes and reduce shipping times.
The two main shipping policies in Odoo for managing deliveries in sale orders are:
1. As Soon as Possible:
This policy prioritizes immediate delivery of available items in stock. If some items in the order are not in stock, Odoo will create separate delivery orders for the items that are ready to ship.
Use Case: This policy is ideal for businesses that want to minimize delivery delays and ensure that customers receive products as soon as they are available, even if it means splitting the shipment into multiple deliveries.
Workflow:
Odoo creates a delivery order for the items currently in stock.
Backorders are created automatically for items that are out of stock.
Once backordered items are restocked, Odoo generates additional delivery orders to fulfill the remaining items in the sale order.
2. Deliver All Products at Once
Description: This policy ensures that all items in the sale order are shipped together in a single delivery. Odoo waits until all items are in stock before creating the delivery order.
Use Case: This policy is ideal for businesses that want to consolidate shipments to reduce shipping costs or to ensure that customers receive their entire order in one delivery.
Workflow:
Odoo holds the delivery order until all items in the sale order are available in stock.
Once all items are available, a single delivery order is created and processed.
1. Configure Shipping Methods
Before creating a sale order, you need to configure shipping methods under the Inventory module.
Navigate to Inventory > Configuration > Delivery Methods.
Create or configure delivery methods based on your shipping policies (e.g., free shipping, flat rate, or by weight).
Define the criteria for each delivery method (cost calculation, available delivery types, etc.).
2. Set Shipping Policy on Product
Shipping policies can be defined per product to control whether a product will be shipped with specific delivery methods.
Go to Sales > Products > Products and select a product.
Under the Sales tab, you can configure whether the product requires shipping or not by checking the Can be Sold and Shippable boxes.
Optionally, set a specific shipping policy for the product if needed (like shipping rules per product category).
3. Create a Sale Order
When creating a sale order, the system will consider shipping methods and policies to manage delivery.
Navigate to Sales > Orders > Sales Orders.
Click on Create to start a new sale order.
Set shipping policy as "When all products are ready." in the Sales tab
Once the quotation has been saved, click the CONFIRM button to turn it into a sales order, as seen in the screenshot below.
The item's delivery procedure can then be initiated by choosing the delivery option.
In this case, you can see that, as seen in the screenshot below, you will not have any back orders and the stage will be in "Waiting."
Since not all products are available, deliveries will be postponed under this shipping policy. The order will not be fulfilled until the stock is restocked to a sufficient amount.
2.Set shipping policy as "Shipping as soon as possible." in the Sales tab
the second kind of delivery policy, which permits products with backorders to be shipped as quickly as possible, as seen in the screenshot below.
Once the quotation has been saved, click the CONFIRM button to turn it into a sales order, as seen in the screenshot below.
you may access this under the Sales tab because the shipping policy is set to dispatch the product as soon as feasible.
Proceed to the product's delivery smart tab and verify the information as before.This section shows that the product is "Ready for delivery," despite the fact that there is not enough of it available. The quantity in stock is displayed, and the remaining products are put on backorder.
