Autopilot AI Shipping Automation

1. Strategy Creation You can create multiple shipping strategies, each with its own name and set of rules. For example, you might have:

• A "Standard Shipping" strategy for regular orders

• A "Free Shipping" strategy for promotional orders

• A "Manual Review" strategy for high-value or unusual shipments

2. Conditional Logic The system evaluates each shipment against your defined conditions to determine which strategy should apply. Conditions can be based on:

• Order Details: Customer notes, order tags, shipping method requested, source store

• Shipment Characteristics: Total weight, box count, total value of items

• Destination: Country, state/province, city, zip/postal code

3. Rate Filtering Once a strategy is selected, it filters the available shipping rates based on criteria you define:

• Cost Range: Set minimum and maximum acceptable costs

• Delivery Speed: Limit to rates that deliver within a certain number of days

• Carrier Selection: Include or exclude specific carriers

• Service Types: Include or exclude specific service levels (e.g., Ground, Express, Overnight)

• Tracking: Require that rates include tracking information

4. Best Rate Selection From the filtered options, the system chooses the best rate based on a balance between:

• Cost: Lower shipping price

• Speed: Faster delivery time

You control this balance with a slider - move it toward "Cost" to prioritize cheaper options, or toward "Speed" to prioritize faster delivery.

5. Auto-Approval Strategies can be configured to automatically purchase rates without manual review if:

• The shipping cost is below a maximum dollar amount

• The shipping cost is below a certain percentage of the order's retail value

If these conditions aren't met, the shipment will require manual review before purchase.

Decision Flow

1. When a shipment is ready to purchase rates, the system evaluates it against all your strategies in order

2. The first strategy whose conditions match the shipment is selected

3. That strategy's filters are applied to available shipping rates

4. The best rate is chosen based on the cost/speed preference

5. If auto-approval conditions are met, the rate is purchased automatically; otherwise, it awaits manual approval

Strategy Priority

Strategies are evaluated from top to bottom. Place more specific strategies (like "International Orders over $500") above more general ones (like "All International Orders") to ensure the right strategy is selected.

Default Strategy

You can set a default strategy that will be used if no other strategy's conditions match a shipment. This ensures every shipment has a strategy applied.

The following conditions can be used when creating strategy rules. Each condition evaluates a specific aspect of the shipment or order to determine if a strategy
should apply.

Order Information

Text

The delivery instructions or notes provided by the customer

Order Tags

Text List

 Tags assigned to the order (e.g., "VIP", "Free Shipping", "Rush")

Shipping Method

Text

The shipping method the customer selected at checkout

Source

Store Selection

Which store/sales channel the order came from

Shipment Characteristics

Box Count

Number

 How many boxes/packages are in the shipment

Total Weight

 Weight (with unit)

The combined weight of all boxes in the shipment

Less than 5 lb
Greater than or equal to 1 kg
Between conditions using two rules

Shipment Total

Money

The total retail value of all items in the shipment

Country

 Country Selection

The destination country

State

State/Province Selection

The destination state or province

City

Text

The destination city name

Zip

Text

The destination zip code

Combining Conditions

Grouping Logic

Within each strategy, you can combine multiple conditions using:

1) AND Logic - ALL conditions must be true

• Example: Country equals "United States" AND Total Weight less than 5 lb AND Order Tags contains "Standard"

2) OR Logic - ANY condition must be true

• Example: Order Tags contains "Rush" OR Shipping Method contains "Express" OR Shipment Total greater than $500

You can create multiple condition groups (branches) within a single strategy, each with their own AND/OR logic and leading to different outcomes.

Example 1: Standard Domestic Shipping

Conditions:

Filters:

Auto-Approve:

• If shipping cost under $10

• If shipping is less than 20% of order value

Best Rate: Balanced 50/50 between cost and speed

Example 2: Free Shipping Promotions

Conditions:

Filters:

Auto-Approve:

Best Rate: 100% weighted toward lowest cost

Autopilot Criteria

In the first part of the autopilot creation you will provide some criteria and if/then breakdown for when certain shipping strategies should be used. You can string together multiple criteria and depending on if the order qualifies the autopilot system will direct the order to use the appropriate strategy. 

• 1) You can enable nesting of subsequent if/then statements to get multi-layer requirements that must be met in order for a shipping strategy to be selected

• 2) Select the classification criteria (these are listed above in this doc)

• 3) Select which type of comparison to make for each classifier

• 4) Choose or enter the value to look for given the criteria which will narrow down the available options to those that match this classification

• 5) Additional classifiers that must be meet in order for a shipping strategy to be selected

• 6) the shipping strategy that will be selected if the criteria is met - these are created below the purchase rate selection and you can add multiple shipping strategies within one protocol and as the AI works through your criteria this will get to the appropriate option

• 7) Add a second layer to your purchase rate option which has a new classification criteria and optionally a different shipping strategy

• 8) The default shipping strategy if no other criteria is met

Shipping Strategy

When you fulfill orders in SKUSavvy and an order matches some criteria the automation part of autopilot will select the corresponding shipping strategy and then choose the rate that matches the shipping policy decisions included. This will determine if the shipping rate can automatically be purchased, or if it needs manual review. This can also determine which carriers, or specific carrier services should be used, whether tracking is required, and others. 

• 1) Create a new strategy, these are used in the protocol setup in the first part of the setup as an output from the criteria you set up

• 2) Name for your shipping strategy which will appear as a dropdown option in the protocol

• 3) Choose whether this shipping strategy can automatically be approved so that autopilot will purchase the rate for you and print without any human input

• 4) Auto approval conditions which must be met, this is for the max cost the shipping rate could be

• 5) Max % of shipment cost. Based on this percentage the shipment cost could not exceed this percentage of the orders total cost to be considered valid for this strategy

• 6) Narrow down available shipping rates to within a min or max range set here

• 7) Choose the available carriers (USPS, FedEx, AusPost, Canada Post) and specific services available (USPS Ground Advantage, FedEx 2-Day, Canada Post Ground, etc.)

• 8) Filter out shipping rates based on the max number of delivery days the shipping service takes

• 9) Indicate whether the rate chosen should require tracking on the shipment

• 10) Slider scale to indicate the preference for speed vs. cost when actually selecting a rate

Understanding Speed vs. Cost

The sliding scale on a shipping strategy is designed to assist the AI in your rate selection. With increments of 5 as you slide up or down SKUSavvy will provide different weights to the AI for rate selection between speed of delivery and cost of service. See the example below:

{ deliveryDays: 3, cost: $5 }
{ deliveryDays: 2, cost: $10 }
{ deliveryDays: 10, cost: $3.00 }

1) Identify the mix/max of each factor

deliveryDays: 2-10
cost: 3-10

2) Assign a z-score to each shipping service (0=best, 1=worst)

Understand Z-scores

Rate 1: { deliveryDays: 3, cost: $5 } -> { deliveryScore: 0.12, costScore: 0.28 }
Rate 2: { deliveryDays: 2, cost: $10 } -> { deliveryScore: 0.00, costScore: 1.00 }
Rate 3: { deliveryDays: 10, cost: $3 } -> { deliveryScore: 1.00, costScore: 0.00 }

3) Final scores (costWeight = 75%, speedWeight = 25%):

Rate 1: score = 0.24
Rate 2: score = 0.75
Rate 3: score = 0.25

Rate 1 would be chosen because it is the lowest score

Tap on the information icon next to 'Best Option' to get a full breakdown of the rate choice and you will get a breakdown like below:

Autopilot Disengaged

When you first use autopilot it will show as disengaged meaning it will still show the best rate based on your protocol but will not purchase a label automatically until engaged.

• 1) Pack items and select a box size like normal

• 2) Shows autopilot suggested shipping strategy

• 3) Shows that autopilot is engaged. CLICK on this to engage it, and for subsequent batches this will stay on. Each user will need to engage autopilot on their account.

Autopilot Engaged without Automatic Purchasing Because of Filters

• 1) Pack items and select a box size like normal

• 2) Shows autopilot is engaged and the shipping strategy that would have been chosen

• 3) Shows that the label could not automatically be purchased because it it outside of the automatic rate purchasing allowed criteria

• 4) Robot icon indicates the rate that would have been purchased if automated purchasing was allowed on this order