Integrating with USPS API is easy if you know what you’re doing, unfortunately usps.com doesn’t help much when it comes to this. Here is what you need to do to make the software work with USPS (this was written for version 3.6.3).
Step 1. Go to here: http://www.usps.com/webtools/ and click the sing up by the Access USPS Website Tools in the right side.
Step 2. Fill out the information and wait for an email to come to you. They say it will take 24 hours but it normally takes about 20 minutes. (make sure to check your junk email)
Step 3. In the email you will see a username and password. Pay attention to that and the phone number at the bottom. The rest of the email is useless to you because it’s about testing information that is irrelevant to pinnacle cart.
Step 4. Go into your admin area, rollover cart settings, shipping management, click real time shipping configurations, then scroll down to the USPS section. Where it says: USPS Web Tools User ID. Copy and paste the username from the USPS API email.
Step 5. Call the number at the bottom of the email (ICCC Staff) to activate the production url. It doesn’t matter if you didn’t test the url because pinnacle cart has already done that for you. In about 5 minutes you will get another email with your production API url. The call may take some time so feel free to email, but I would rather hang on the phone and make sure it got done. (MAKE SURE TO CHECK YOUR JUNK EMAIL)
Step 6. Copy the production url from the new email you got from USPS. It should look something like this: http://production.shippingapis.com/ShippingAPI.dll . Make sure you paste this url to BOTH SECTIONS: Server URL for USPS Rating Too and Server URL for USPS Tracking Tool. IMPORTANT, if you don’t call to activate your username this will NOT WORK. You need to take step 5 to make sure this is activated. Don’t use the secure url because this will not work also.
Step 7. Once you have activated the API url you can click on the real time methods tab at the top of the page (you are still in the shipping methods page). On this page you will need to select all the USPS methods from the Carrier Method Name box (it will say international methods at the top of the box in bold and italic). Good USPS shipping methods to select are: USPS express, USPS standard postal, USPS priority are all normal shipping methods you can offer. The others are for more unique situations but if you want to offer them I would suggest contacting your local post office to understand what they are. You can also scroll down further to offer international shipping in the same section.
Step 8. As you select carrier method names it will default the rest of the settings on the page. I would suggest keeping those settings because 99% of them are correct. Make sure to add all the shipping methods individually.
Step 9. The last step is making sure you add weight to each of your products. If you don’t have a weight on each product this shipping method will not work. To add weight rollover categories/products, then manage products. From here you can click on the edit icon to change the weight on each product.
I hope this helped you set up your USPS shipping method in pinnacle cart. If you need any more help please contact www.webBizIdeas.com for custom website design and business development.