ShadeMaker Products will ship to points in the United States and Canada. We charge actual freight costs and will provide a firm freight quote if requested. All roll up awnings longer than 8 feet long require truck shipment unless picked up at our plant.
A number of factors can run up freight costs excessively. One of the worst of these is the residential delivery fee. In some areas of the country at certain times of the year, residential delivery fees can exceed $100. For this reason, we strongly recommend that purchasers provide a bonifide commercial address for delivery. You should expect that a business run from a home will not qualify as a commercial address.
Other frequently encountered charges are: Single Shipment charges, Over length charges, Fuel surcharges, and Interline charges.
ShadeMaker Products Corp. receives significant freight discounts from our regular truck lines by virtue of the volume of our shipments. We pass these discounts to our customers in the form of lowered freight charges.
Certain types of shipments severely impact our discounts. Shipments that are handed over enroute for delivery by another freight line can significantly reduce our discounts. For this reason we attempt to ship each shipment on a carrier that can also deliver to you without interlining. Customers sometimes request that we ship COD to them. By COD we mean collect on delivery for both the awning and the freight. In these cases, the freight carrier views the shipment as your shipment and the discounts provided are your discounts. Unless you have a discount program established with the carrier, you will pay the full freight charge without any discount.
Fuel surcharges are adjusted weekly and reflect the current costs of purchasing fuel by the trucklines.
Single shipment charges are imposed by some truck lines when an outgoing shipment is the only shipment. We attempt to ship on trucklines that do not impose single shipment charges or to tender multiple shipments to those that do. Single shipment charges will only be passed to you if your shipment is urgent and your location is in a difficult to serve area that does not permit a choice of carriers.
Overlength charges are charged by some trucklines for items longer than 14 or 15 feet. We have been successful in minimizing these charges through choice of truckline and by negotiation.