SendGround

SendGround is a last-mile delivery platform. This plugin connects your WooCommerce store to it, so an order you have been paid for reaches your courier without anyone retyping an address.

What it does

• Offers SendGround delivery at checkout, as a shipping method in the zones you choose. One method shows every service SendGround quotes for that cart and that address — same day, next day, a scheduled day — each with its own name, price and arrival, and the buyer picks. Or it shows a single service, at a price you set.
• Sends an order to SendGround when it reaches the status you nominate: as soon as it is paid, once you have packed it, or when you mark it done.
• Leaves orders alone when there is nothing to deliver: a cart of downloads, or a customer collecting at your store.
• Records the tracking code that comes back, and shows it on the order screen, on the customer’s order page, and inside the emails your store already sends.
• Emails the buyer at the three moments of a delivery, each editable and each with its own switch: when the order gets its tracking code, when the courier collects it, and when it is delivered.
• Moves the order on when the parcel is delivered, and writes what happened as a note, so your order list reflects the round trip without anyone watching a dashboard.
• Adds a note to the order when something goes wrong, saying what, so you can fix it and let the order try again.
• Cancels the delivery in SendGround when you cancel an order that was already sent, and tells you when SendGround cancels one, leaving the order ready to be sent again.
• Prints the shipping labels: one order from its screen or the list, or many at once as a single PDF from the orders list.
• Lets you ask SendGround to report an order again, one or many at a time, when a report did not reach your store.
• Gives you a tracking page on your own site: put the [sendground_tracking] shortcode on any page and buyers follow their shipment there, by code.

Your courier’s brand, not ours

SendGround is the platform your courier runs on. You and your buyers deal with your courier, so that is who you both see: once the store is connected, the option at checkout, the tracking page and the emails carry your courier’s own name and logo, and so do the “Send to…” button, the order notes and the Tracking column in your admin. “SendGround” stays only where the platform itself is meant: the plugin’s name, the token, the connection. Until the store connects, everything says SendGround.

How prices work

By default each option carries the price SendGround quotes for that order, taxes included: your SendGround rates decide, and nothing is typed in WooCommerce. A quoted price can be shaped without leaving the zone: an amount added on top for packaging or handling, a floor and a ceiling on what the buyer pays, and a cart amount from which delivery is free. Prefer your own price? Pick one service on the zone and give it a fixed cost, the same way you set every other rate; SendGround’s arrival promise is still shown next to it.

External service

This plugin requires an account with SendGround (https://www.sendground.com), a third-party delivery service. It does nothing on its own: without an account and its API token, no data leaves your store.

Once connected, the plugin sends SendGround the details of an order it needs to deliver, at the moment that order reaches the status you chose in the settings (Processing unless you change it):

• your WooCommerce order number, as a reference
• the delivery name, address, and contact phone
• the items on the order, by SKU, or the parcels the checkout quote predicted, depending on how your account is configured
• the pickup day the buyer chose, for a scheduled service
• any note the customer left at checkout
• the amount the courier has to collect at the door, when the buyer chose cash on delivery
• the coordinates of the delivery address, when the buyer pinned it at checkout

It also asks SendGround, once per order, how your account is configured, so the order is built the way your courier expects, and, when connecting, who your courier is: the name and logo shown to buyers.

When you cancel an order that was already sent, the plugin tells SendGround to cancel the delivery, and reads the order back once to see whether it could.

While a buyer is at checkout, the plugin asks SendGround for a quote of the delivery, so the option can show when it would arrive and, if you choose, what it costs. That request carries the town of the delivery address (city, state, postal code and country) or the pin the buyer placed, and the items in the cart with their size and weight, or the number of parcels. No name, contact details or payment details travel with it.

Nothing else is sent. Payment details are never sent.

SendGround reports back to your store when a parcel is collected, delivered, could not be delivered, or when the delivery is cancelled. Those reports are signed with a key issued to your store alone, and one that does not verify is refused.

Service terms: https://www.sendground.com/terms
Privacy policy: https://www.sendground.com/privacy-policy

Google Maps (optional)

If you switch on Location on the map in the settings and enter a Google Maps API key, your checkout loads Google Maps Platform (https://mapsplatform.google.com) in the buyer’s browser, to offer an address search and a map where the buyer can drag a pin to their door. What the buyer types in that search box, and the place they choose, go to Google under your key and your Google account. The coordinates of the pin are stored on the order and sent to SendGround with it, so the courier goes to the exact spot.

With the map off, or without a key, nothing is loaded from Google and the checkout is left exactly as it is.

Google Maps Platform terms: https://cloud.google.com/maps-platform/terms
Google privacy policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy