How Do I Set Up Flat Rate Shipping (per item or per order)?

To set up flat rate shipping navigate to System -> Configuration and click on Shipping Methods in the left column.

The first dropdown is Enabled. If you select yes the flat rate method will appear as a quote in the shopping cart and on the shipping page during the checkout. If it is set to no customers will not see the Flat Rate method.

You are able to enter the text both for the Title and the Method Name. In this case we have the Title set to Flat Rate and the Method set to Fixed.

You are then able to set the flat rate to enact per item or per order. If you set the rate to be per item it will be multiplied by the total quantity of items in the cart. If you have 2 of the same item or 2 different items the rate will be the same.

If you set the Flat Rate to enact on the order the rate will be applied only once, regardless of the amount of items in the customer’s shopping cart. This can be especially useful for marketing efforts. Enter the amount of the shipping and a handling fee, if you wish to add one.

You can define the countries filter, the message that will appear if this method is not available but you choose to display it anyways, and the sort order of the method to choose its position in relation to the other shipping methods. Remember to hit the Save Config button at the top of the page and your customers will be able to select the flat rate as their shipping method.