In order to service the vast landmass which makes up Australia, many transport providers will seek to work with regional transport providers or freight on-forwarders who specialise in delivering freight to the outer areas. 

As a result of this, transport providers may have different fuel levies based on the zones or States that the freight is being delivered to. In order to cater for these differences in fuel levies, MachShip has developed the Carrier Zone Fuel Surcharge. 

1. Create the Fuel Surcharges

In order to be able to assign a fuel surcharge against a from zone, to zone or from zone - to zone combination for a carrier, you will first need to ensure that the fuel surcharge exists. The following link will outline how to create these fuel surcharges. 

2. Navigate to Create Carrier Zone Fuel Surcharges

Select Admin, Other Options and Carrier Zone Fuel Surcharges.

Select Create Carrier Account Zone Fuel Surcharge.

This will take you through to the Create Carrier Zone Fuel Surcharge page. 

3. Select the Carrier, Carrier Account and Service

Using the text box select the Carrier. Note that when you begin typing you will then select from the available typeahead.

Once the carrier is selected you will then be presented with your available Carrier Accounts and Services.

Note: A surcharge needs to be assigned against both an account and a service. 

Important: Service-Level Configuration Requirement

CRITICAL: Zone Fuel Surcharges must be configured for EACH service level that the carrier offers. If a carrier provides EXPRESS, GENERAL, and HAZARDOUS services, you must create separate zone fuel surcharge entries for each service. A surcharge configured only for GENERAL service will NOT apply to EXPRESS shipments, even if the zones and carrier account are otherwise identical.

Example: If a carrier offers EXPRESS, GENERAL, and HAZARDOUS services and charges a Tasmanian fuel levy on all three, you must create three separate zone fuel surcharge entries:

- Carrier + EXPRESS + Zone 733 → Tasmanian Fuel Levy

- Carrier + GENERAL + Zone 733 → Tasmanian Fuel Levy

- Carrier + HAZARDOUS + Zone 733 → Tasmanian Fuel Levy

If you forget to configure a service level, consignments using that service will not receive the zone-specific fuel surcharge and will fall back to the carrier account-level or carrier-level fuel surcharge (if configured).

4. Assign the From Zone, To Zone or the From Zone To Zone Combination.

If there is a zone-specific fuel surcharge you will need to advise MachShip when to apply the surcharge. Neither of the zone fields is required so if the surcharge only applies to the delivery zone then just assign the zone in the To Zone box and vice versa. 

Please note that the zone needs to be selected from the typeahead. 

The zone selected does not need to be the direct pricing zone. MachShip will assess every zone against the delivery or the pickup suburb and check if a zone-specific fuel surcharge is applicable.

The order of priority will be:

1. Carrier Zone Specific Fuel Surcharge against Pricing Zone

2. Carrier Zone Specific Fuel Surcharge against Parent Zone of Pricing Zone

3. Carrier Zone Specific Fuel Surcharge against any Zone assigned to the suburb

4. Carrier Account Service Fuel Surcharge

5. Carrier Account Fuel Surcharge

What the above will mean is that if a carrier, Vellex in the example above, has a different fuel surcharge for delivery into Tasmania, users will only need to set up the fuel surcharge to apply against a created zone of Tas and not against every pricing zone which that carrier has for that particular state. This lowers the admin in setting up a Carrier Zone Fuel Surcharge significantly. 

If you do not see, or cannot find a region or state-based zone has been setup please contact support@machship.com.

5. Assign the Fuel Surcharge

Select the applicable Fuel Surcharge which should be applied from the fuel surcharge drop-down.

6. Save and Create the Carrier Account Zone Fuel Surcharge

7. Test

In order to ensure that you have set up the fuel surcharge as expected please run a test quote under the circumstances which should generate the carrier zone fuel surcharge to apply. Should there be any issues at all please contact support@machship.com.