Checkout workflow and Delivery methods

I've read the checkout workflow documentation several times and have tried configuring my checkout the way I believe it should be and it just isn't working for me. It sounds logical from the documentation but I must be missing something important. What I want is a 3 step process:
1. Login or Register
2. confirm address, cart contents and total, and pick delivery method (regular or expedited), finish order
3. Thank you message

I set up 2 shipping methods in the Hikashop Manual Shipping Plugin for Regular Delivery and Expedited Delivery. The Manual plugin and methods inside it are all enabled. I configured my cart in several ways, none of which showed a shipping method to pick.
login_address_shipping_payment_confirm_coupon_cart_status,end
login_address_shipping_cart,confirm,end

We collect payment on delivery so I don't need payment methods. So I don't understand why my second workflow doesn't work. Also, I have made sure that my products have a weight so the shipping method will show up. Do you also have to put in dimensions?

Hi,

The confirm view is just logical, so if you put it alone in a step, you won't see nothing. We didn't really try a workflow without the payment view and it might cause unexpected behavior. However, there is a payment method for Collect on Delivery, so if you use it, it will work properly. Based on what you're telling us, I would advice you to use this workflow:
login,address_shipping_payment_confirm_coupon_cart_status,end

Normally, if you don't have any shipping methods selection and that you don't see an error message but that you correctly added and published them, there are two possibilities:
1/ error messages are not displayable in your template. You can check on this and maybe fix it easily : www.hikashop.com/support/documentation/61.html#messages
2/ you don't have the manual shipping plugin published. Please go to your joomla plugin manager and verify that the plugin is published.

Finally, I remember we fixed some issues in early versions of HikaShop with shipping methods, so if you do not use the latest version (1.2.1 as of now), you should update to it and try again.

I don't see a Manual Shipping plugin in the Joomla modules r in the Hika Content Modules. Is there supposed to be one in there? Under System-Shipping Methods I see Hikashop Manual Shipping Plugin and it is enabled as well as the options inside it.

EDIT: I also have the Hikashop Collect on Delivery plugin enabled under Payment Methods but I don't see any options.

The manual plugin is a joomla plugin not a joomla module. So you should find it in the joomla menu Extensions->plugin manager

They are both enabled in the Joomla-plugins.

With login,address_shipping_payment_confirm_coupon_cart_status,end I am getting stuck at the final stage of checkout and still not seeing the shipping methods, or even my custom fields.

Ok, so there is a problem somewhere. Do you have the latest version ? Did you check your template for the message display issue ?
If yes, could you send me an access to your website so that I can check on that ? You can send the information to nicolas@hikashop.com
Also, if there is indeed an issue and we can't reproduce the problem on our test websites, I might need an FTP access to the website.

I just sent my login info to you. Let me know if you need FTP. Thanks!

Hi,

So I looked at your setup. The fact that you don't see the shipping methods is because of two problems.
1/ You added spaces in the weight units configuration option. However, the main unit is kg (the first one) and your products weight is in lb. So the system always tries to convert the weight to kg before checking the weight. We have a table of all the units to know how to convert them. Since the unit of your products is " lb" instead of "lb", the system doesn't find the unit in the conversion table and the weight becomes 0. 0 means no shipping needed. We didn't think someone would add spaces in there (the goal was to be able to change the order of the units or remove unnecessary units)... We will add some code to handle that. In the mean time, I've revert the modification to remove spaces.
2/ The weight of your variants are not set.
Normally, the weight of the product should be automatically used if the variant weight is not set but there seems to be a bug with float comparison in the function checking that.
The bug can easily circumvented by setting a weight in the variant. Ive done that for the "Beef Tenderloin (loin)" variant on your website.

After those two modifications, I'm able to select shipping methods when ordering this "Beef Tenderloin (loin)" product from your store. On our end, we will change a bit our code to handle properly those cases.

The payment method needed to be saved once before being displayed.

OK, thanks for your help. There's just so many little details to know about this software and so little documentation available for it. I somehow knew it was my error but couldn't find why. Thanks again for looking at my settings and fixing them.

Well, you were really unlucky on those two as the second point really is a bug and the first one is half/half

I prefer to fix them over adding some documentation explaining how to circumvent them. Next users won't have the problem, so no need for a documentation on that.

We already have a lot of pages of documentation and the goal is not to increase documentation but to improve hikashop so that you don't need the documentation

That's a very noble goal indeed! The less I have to read the better. Well, I'm having another issue. All of the sudden the shipping methods are gone again. I'm really confused. Can you take another look? I see there are shipping weights in the products, no spaces between the units of measurement in the configuration, the plugins are enabled and the workflow is set to what you said above.

EDIT: I apologize, the shipping is showing up but only after I click Next from the Address and payment info (which is technically the second step, since login is first). I thought that an underscore would keep it on the same 'page', but it is confirming the address and payment method on every step. I'd rather it look cleaner with everything in one step, or second best I'd like to have the login/register first with nothing else on the page, then the shipping/delivery and payment methods only, then a confirmation page to verify the address, shipping, cart and payment. What do you suggest?

Mmm, I see what you mean. You're right, after entering the registration information, the user shouldn't have to click next to validate the address in order to display shipping methods.
We will change that behavior.

You can do so yourself by changing the code to in the file components/com_hikashop/controllers/checkout.php near line 410

Nice! Thanks! Works great now. Is there a way to allow the user to edit a custom field in the address table? I have a preferred delivery time set up but it is only accessible from the initial registration screen.

Sure. You can create a menu linking to the address management interface via the joomla menu management.
Note that the addresses added to an order are a copy of the user addresses. So if a user modify an address, it won't modify the address in the order. That is because an order is a contract set between you and the user at a certain point in time. If you change a product price after an order is made, the price in the order does not change. Well, it's the same for addresses
This address management is there so that when a user come back to the store, he will already have its addresses entered and will be able to finish an order faster.
The only way to change something in an order is for you to edit it via the back end interface. Modifications will be logged automatically so that you can keep trace of what happened to the order after its creation.

I think you misunderstood. I have a custom field that I added to the Address table for choosing a delivery time. It is associated with the user and not the order. In the checkout there is a place after registration that shows the address and lets you edit it. The delivery time that was selected in the previous registration step is not displayed in the billing address, but if you click to edit the address you see the field and can change it. I would like to have the delivery time seen before they click edit so they know they can edit it.

Display of custom address field needs to be changed in the address template view. You need to go to Display->Views and search for address_template and edit that view.
I just went to your website and did it for you.

You rock! Thanks for the superior support.

Sorry for so many questions...but I have another. I took the _status out of my workflow in hopes that when I click Next after verifying my address and picking delivery options that I would get the end of the flow instead of the same screen with messages at the bottom telling what delivery and payment options I made. But instead it just refreshes the page. Does the flow not work without _status? It seems like an unnecessary step.

Once you select the shipping method, the page needs to be displayed again to include shipping fees in the order total before finalizing the order.
The status view is just there to display which payment and shipping method you choose.

Checkout process complete! Thanks for all your help.