Business Central Shipping: Shipping Cost in the Quote Before the Shipment Exists, Mark-up Included

A leading experiential marketing company builds branded spaces for trade shows, corporate offices, and retail settings. Exhibit structures, graphics, rental furnishings- all of it ships out to the show floor, and much of it has to come back when the event ends.

So shipping isn’t a back-office task here. It touches nearly every stage of an engagement, from the first quote to the last return. That’s why it needed to be simpler, connected, and smooth. The company needed Business Central shipping that runs inside Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, not in a separate set of carrier tools.

Want the full story? Download the complete case study (PDF)—the in-depth version with every step of the Business Central shipping workflow, from sales quote to rental return.

The Challenge: The Shipment Was Only One Part of the Problem

Every label meant leaving Business Central. The team created shipping labels in FedEx Ship Manager, UPS WorldShip, or carrier websites, then re-keyed order details that already lived in the ERP. It’s a time-consuming, repetitive task, and that’s only the start.

Four more questions kept coming up across the event logistics workflow:

• What will be the shipping cost before we ship? The team needed a shipping estimate before a shipment existed. It is required earlier in the sales process, not after the fact.
• How should the mark-up appear in the quote? Calculated dynamically in the Sales Quote, not manually.
• What happens when regular and rental items travel together? One shipment had to carry both.
• What happens when rental items need to come back? Outbound Shipment → Rental Item → Inbound Return. In both directions.

Each answer needed a home inside Business Central. That’s where MetaShip came in.

The Solution: MetaShip for Business Central- One connected System for Everything

The company implemented MetaShip, MetaOption’s native Business Central shipping software. It runs on MetaOption’s own shipping API layer, the Meta Shipping APIs, a direct line from the Business Central extension to UPS, FedEx, USPS, DHL, Purolator and more. That gives the team multi-carrier shipping with no third-party aggregator like EasyPost or 2Ship in the middle.

With MetaShip, the company can:

• Estimate before anything ships. Quick Shipping Estimate returns the cost before a shipment exists.
• Apply the mark-up automatically. Dynamic Shipping Mark-up reflects it straight into the Sales Quote.
• Run one workflow for every item. Regular and rental items ship together, and each rental is covered out and back (Rental Outbound & Inbound Shipping).
• Stay inside Business Central. Carrier labels and tracking numbers are created without leaving the system.

Freight Shipment and HAZMAT Products Shipping are in development and are not part of the completed implementation yet.

The Results: Shipping Became Part of the Conversation Earlier

Shipping used to be what happened after the quote. Now it’s part of the quote. The shipping charge, mark-up included, sits in the Sales Quote before anyone creates the shipment, and the team creates labels without leaving Business Central.

• Shipping cost and mark-up in the quote, before the shipment exists
• Labels and tracking numbers inside Business Central, not in separate carrier tools
• One workflow for regular (one-way) and rental (round-trip) items
• Rental returns handled through to the inbound leg
• Fewer moving parts, with direct carrier connections and no aggregator to keep in sync