{"id":1780,"date":"2019-04-15T21:04:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-15T21:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shipbob.com\/au\/blog\/real-time-carrier-rates\/"},"modified":"2025-09-27T18:36:40","modified_gmt":"2025-09-27T18:36:40","slug":"real-time-carrier-rates","status":"publish","type":"blog","link":"https:\/\/www.shipbob.com\/au\/blog\/real-time-carrier-rates\/","title":{"rendered":"Real-Time Courier Rates: How to Save You and Your Customers Money"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Table of Contents<\/p>

** Minutes<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n

What is real-time courier shipping?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

3 benefits of offering real-time courier calculated shipping<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What to consider when you switch to real-time rates<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enable real-time courier rates with Shopify and ShipBob<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

What do you want to learn?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Request Fulfilment Rates from ShipBob<\/strong><\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n

One of the biggest pain points<\/a> for many ecommerce businesses is figuring out how much to charge their customers for shipping. It\u2019s not always feasible to offer 2-day delivery<\/a> or free shipping<\/a>, as you may not cover your costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, you don\u2019t want to make your customers pay too much. According to Shopify, 80% of stores<\/a> overcharge for shipping when they set rates manually. This can have just as bad of an effect, leading to high cart abandonment rates<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But when your customers are scattered across the country \u2014 or even globe \u2014 the cost of shipping an item to Customer A may be vastly different from shipping the same item to Customer B. Of course, factoring in varying weights and dimensions<\/a> for each package makes these calculations even more difficult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, how do you consistently charge each customer the right shipping amount?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Real-time courier shipping is an ecommerce shipping<\/a> option that takes a more precise approach to calculating shipping costs<\/a>.
<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is real-time courier shipping?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Real-time courier shipping is when the exact shipping rates that couriers<\/a> charge are automatically pulled in to checkout for any given order. The rates take order weight, dimensions, and the customer\u2019s shipping destination into account to display the accurate rate to the customer once they are done adding items to their cart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Real-time courier shipping allows ecommerce businesses to charge every customer the actual amount it will cost to ship the order, which helps ensure you don\u2019t overcharge some customers or lose money on other orders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3 benefits of offering real-time courier calculated shipping<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Setting shipping rates yourself manually is not always exact and can be very time-consuming based on the level of customisation (e.g., rules for countries, order weights, total order values, and more). Real-time courier calculated shipping helps in several ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. Calculate shipping costs automatically<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Shoppers will see real-time courier rates displayed at checkout as soon as they enter their shipping destination, without you having to do any complex calculations yourself to get the accurate amount.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. Charge customers the right amount<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Unlike flat rate shipping<\/a>, real-time courier calculated shipping means you charge customers the correct amount every time, so you don\u2019t have to worry that it will be too much or not enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Drive more international sales<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Researching international shipping costs<\/a> can be tough. With real-time courier shipping, you know your customers will always get an accurate rate from any location, including abroad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What to consider when you switch to real-time rates<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re thinking of making the switch to real-time rates, you still have some important decisions to make. The following will help you shape your real-time rates strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Which countries you will ship products to<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

You have the ability to ship to almost any country, but that doesn\u2019t necessarily mean you should ship to every country. Different countries have various regulations, tariffs, taxes, and requirements for incoming shipments, and shipping and logistics costs<\/a> can be very high.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Which courier(s) you\u2019ll choose<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Each courier has its own advantages and disadvantages regarding specialties, speed, cost, and flexibility. Look at UPS, FedEx, USPS, and DHL and compare the costs. The more couriers you partner with, the more places and customers you can reach; However, you may forgo discounted bulk rates when your business is going to several couriers, unless you work with a 3PL<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How to incorporate handling costs<\/h3>\n\n\n\n


<\/a>\nWith real-time courier rates, you are passing 100% of the direct shipping cost onto the customer. Handling costs<\/a>, which include packing boxes and moving product, are not included in these shipping rates, so you must be aware of how you will make up these costs and not forget to factor them in when looking at your margin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enable real-time courier rates with Shopify and ShipBob<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Brands that outsource retail fulfilment<\/a> to ShipBob and are on the Shopify Advanced plan (or Shopify plan paid annually) can use ShipBob\u2019s free Shopify app, CartBob<\/a>, which displays live rates at checkout. The app uses ShipBob\u2019s Fulfilment Estimator API and lets the merchant pass on the exact cost of shipping directly to the customer. It provides the following benefits:<\/p>\n\n\n\n