Retail Order Shipping & Handling: Absorb Customer Shipping Costs:


Adjust how much shipping & handling your retail order customer is charged:



Login, click the blue cart button near the top center. You will see an 'Absorb S/H %' setting for domestic as well as INTL.

Setting to a value of zero means all of the TrepStar s/h charges are passed to the customer. This keeps your net proceeds high but you may have a lot of abandoned shopping carts as higher s/h costs will turn off potential customers.

Keep shipping & handling low:
  1. Statistics show one of the main reasons customers will abandon a shopping cart is if the shipping/handling charges are perceived as too high.
  2. We suggest you absorb most of the s/h costs, and raise your retail order price. Test to see if you convert more sales and produce higher net revenue.
  3. Most customers that click a purchase button have already decided they will pay the retail price, so keep your s/h charges low to make sure they complete the purchase.

Setting the 'Absorb S/H Cost %' has these effects:
  1. The customer pays less shipping/handling.
  2. The customer will be more likely to complete the purchase.
  3. The discounted shipping/handling amount will be deducted from your net proceeds:
    1. The discount % is determined by discounting the TrepStar 'Standard' Shipping/Handling fee.
    2. This means if the discount is $3.00, the priority and priority-express rates will be discounted the same amount ($3.00).
    3. If you set 'Absorb S/H Cost %' to 50%, priority and priority-express will NOT be discounted 50%, but instead, 50% of the standard rate discount (probably around $2.50 - $3.00 for single quantity order) will be subtracted from priority and priority-express charges. This keeps your net proceeds consistent.
    4. As an illustration, if the standard rate was $5.00, priority was $10.00 and priority-express was $20.00, a 50% discount would mean the costs would be $2.50 for standard, $7.50 for priority, and $17.50 for priority-express. This way, no matter which shipping method the customer chooses, you will be absorbing only $2.50 of that cost from your net proceeds.
  4. There are two settings. One is for domestic addresses, and the other is for International (INTL). You may choose to set the discount differently for each. INTL postage usually costs a few dollars more than domestic (for small packages).
  5. To test this feature, we recommend you set your retail price up a few dollars, then set the 'Absorb S/H Cost%' to 50. See if you get more sales. Click the blue 'Withdraw' button from within the account area to see sales reports (you will see this button is you have at least one sale).