Best Woocommerce Courier plugin for South Africa

OBX

OBX

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Note: This thread addresses local shipping. For international shipping, click here.


Hi there folks.

I've been looking at some discussions around the best courier company for WordPress/Woocommerce plugin integration. The consensus 3 years ago was The Courier Guy plugin, but the reviews on the WordPress directory, lately seem to point to the plugin not working.

Does anyone have experience with Woocommerce courier plugin integration for South Africa? Which do you think is best?

If I get enough feedback, maybe I'll just start a poll for people to vote :)

I'll add some results to this message as suggestions come in:
Courier Guy | Fastway | Collivery | DHL | Internet Express | Bobgo | Parcel Ninja


[UPDATE: 2022.11.09]
After getting a lot of positive comments regarding Fastway, we decided to use them. It's been a VERY positive experience. These folks know what they're doing! The support is brilliant with specific queries, and they're happy to give advice on general questions... and they never make you feel stupid :p
 
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If you're struggling to find an existing plugin you're happy with, I can do custom plugins for any courier that's got an API for developers.

That way you can base your choice on finding the best courier, rather than the courier with the best WP integration.
 
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Charly said:
If you're struggling to find an existing plugin you're happy with, I can do custom plugins for any courier that's got an API for developers.

That way you can base your choice on finding the best courier, rather than the courier with the best WP integration.
Click to expand...

Thank you - I'll keep that in mind :)
 
I tried Fastway Couriers plugin. It just worked, no real config except to put in the API key and some preferences.

It's not available on the WP directory, you will have to sign up with them first then they'll send it to you together with API keys. The account manager was really helpful and knowledgeable.

This was for a client website and I've never had them contact me to tell me something's not working on the courier side.
 
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From a end user point of view. I recently had some efficient service from.a Company called Internet Express. .

Maybe have a look at them.
 
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OkPlankton said:
I tried Fastway Couriers plugin. It just worked, no real config except to put in the API key and some preferences.

It's not available on the WP directory, you will have to sign up with them first then they'll send it to you together with API keys. The account manager was really helpful and knowledgeable.

This was for a client website and I've never had them contact me to tell me something's not working on the courier side.
Click to expand...

Ocali said:
From a end user point of view. I recently had some efficient service from.a Company called Internet Express. .

Maybe have a look at them.
Click to expand...


Thank you so much for this! Some real-world feedback is exactly what I needed.
 
OBX said:
Hi there folks.

I've been looking at some discussions around the best courier company for WordPress/Woocommerce plugin integration. The consensus 3 years ago was The Courier Guy plugin, but the reviews on the WordPress directory, lately seem to point to the plugin not working.

Does anyone have experience with Woocommerce courier plugin integration for South Africa? Which do you think is best?

If I get enough feedback, maybe I'll just start a poll for people to vote :)

I'll add some results to this message as suggestions come in:
Courier Guy | Fastway | Collivery | DHL | Internet Express

[UPDATE: 2022.11.09]
After getting a lot of positive comments regarding Fastway, we decided to use them. It's been a VERY positive experience. These folks know what they're doing! The support is brilliant with specific queries, and they're happy to give advice on general questions... and they never make you feel stupid :p
Click to expand...
Thanks for this work... we have not had much success in this department especially as we want a courier that has a warehouse to hold stock and ship direct to customers as orders are processed.

Tried Aramex (who have a plugin) but they want 20 orders per day (for warehousing) and that's too much for us to start.

SkyNet also said they could hold stock and started out well with them saying they had no plugin but did have some kind of API. After long delays for quotes, they eventually said they could not do the API - so not even sure but service declined fast. Trying your suggestions
 
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Jayoxox said:
Thanks for this work... we have not had much success in this department especially as we want a courier that has a warehouse to hold stock and ship direct to customers as orders are processed.

Tried Aramex (who have a plugin) but they want 20 orders per day (for warehousing) and that's too much for us to start.

SkyNet also said they could hold stock and started out well with them saying they had no plugin but did have some kind of API. After long delays for quotes, they eventually said they could not do the API - so not even sure but service declined fast. Trying your suggestions
Click to expand...

Hey Jay. I'm glad that you found some use out of this post. That's why I kept updating it!

If you're using Aramex, does it mean you ship internationally? I have an international site coming up, and I'm yet to delve into the rabbit hole of international shipping and couriers, as FastWay is SA only (though they're very happy to refer us to someone once we're ready)
 
Seems like an old thread has been brought back to live. If you can't build your own consider an aggregator like Parcel Ninja

Optimise by Parcelninja | Your all in one courier optimisation software

optimise.parcelninja.com optimise.parcelninja.com

Couriers are mostly all the same: they start with a bang and slowly let you down. The best way to counter that is to make them fight for your business.

We obviously built our own.

We have anywhere between 5 and 10 integrated at any given time. For most areas multiple couriers are competing and our systems assign based off performance.
 
Ipwn 4 said:
Seems like an old thread has been brought back to live. If you can't build your own consider an aggregator like Parcel Ninja

Optimise by Parcelninja | Your all in one courier optimisation software

optimise.parcelninja.com optimise.parcelninja.com

Couriers are mostly all the same: they start with a bang and slowly let you down. The best way to counter that is to make them fight for your business.

We obviously built our own.

We have anywhere between 5 and 10 integrated at any given time. For most areas multiple couriers are competing and our systems assign based off performance.
Click to expand...
Very very interesting. Does this mean one would only need one courier plugin installed on woocommerce in order to make use of multiple service providers?

Also, your statement regarding courier services getting worse over time is a bit of a generalisation. I've had only good service from Fastway.
 
OBX said:
Very very interesting. Does this mean one would only need one courier plugin installed on woocommerce in order to make use of multiple service providers?

Also, your statement regarding courier services getting worse over time is a bit of a generalisation. I've had only good service from Fastway.
Click to expand...
You have obviously not dealt with Fastway Durban yet. I was a big Fastway fan in Gauteng, but in KZN - they suck
 
OBX said:
Very very interesting. Does this mean one would only need one courier plugin installed on woocommerce in order to make use of multiple service providers?

Also, your statement regarding courier services getting worse over time is a bit of a generalisation. I've had only good service from Fastway.
Click to expand...

Yes, one plug in, multiple couriers. The added advantage of Parcel Ninja is they provide a managed service: they track from their side and are proactive when deliveries fail.

Wrt service, it all depends on volumes. If you are only shipping hundreds of orders a month a 1% exception rate might be manageable. When you get to tens of thousands .1% could overwhelm your reviews.
 
RobDcpt said:
When did you try last, its been completely rewritten. Insaka Article in January seems not to agree with your opinion - https://luminarychiefs.com/interviews/insaka-ecommerce-academy-ceo-warrick-kernes/
Click to expand...
I use Pargo for one of my businesses and love the Pargo Point Delivery. What I said was is that the Pargo Plugin (real live test done March 2024) is horrible as it's not mobile responsive; so in a real life test - we opened our new e-commerce stores for 1-day testing and received 25 orders of which 17 were abandoned carts because customers could not figure out how to choose a Pargo Delivery Point. I am guessing API would be the way to go, but as far as their Wordpress plugin - horrid!
 
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