Hi @kathleenvdg,
Thank you for taking the time to share this update and for being open about your concerns. Given what you went through with your previous developers, it makes complete sense to be cautious about making changes, and I want to be very mindful of that while we continue looking at safe ways to test this.
To help reassure you, temporarily deactivating a plugin for testing will not delete your pages, content, or existing settings. When the plugin is reactivated, its functionality and configuration return exactly as they were before. If you would feel more comfortable adding an extra layer of safety, creating a staging site is a good option. A staging site is a separate copy of your website where tests can be done without affecting your live store, and many hosts offer this specifically for situations like this. Here is a guide to carrying out a plugin/theme conflict test: https://woocommerce.com/document/how-to-test-for-conflicts/.
You also mentioned not being familiar with Storefront or Twenty Twenty Four. These are official WordPress themes maintained by the WordPress and WooCommerce teams. Storefront is a lightweight theme built specifically to work smoothly with WooCommerce, and Twenty Twenty Four is a default WordPress theme designed to be clean and reliable. Switching to one of these temporarily is only for testing, to rule out any theme related conflicts, and you can switch straight back to your current theme afterward without losing pages or content.
Since the USPS rates and international service options you are working with are provided by the Octolize shipping plugins, Octolize is in the best position to review how their plugin communicates with USPS and which international services and required fields are made available through their setup. WooCommerce itself does not control those specific USPS service lists.
You mentioned that you have already contacted Octolize and that they have generally been helpful. Could you let me know what they have shared with you so far regarding this specific international shipping issue. Their feedback will help us decide the most accurate and least disruptive next steps.
Octolize looked at the Loom video I sent over and are looking at the website now through the backend to see if there is an issue. I just sent that over this morning and we will see what they say.
I’m thinking I might just hire someone to do the plugins. I’m feeling like I’m in above my head. I’ll see if I have the courage to play with it this week thanks to your very good explanations. If I do it myself, is this what you are suggesting?
- deactivate ALL plugins except for woo commerce.
- add storefront or Twenty-Twenty Four to test the site
- use the link to test for conflicts on my site. Are you suggesting to do this one by one or ALL of the plugins at the same time?
- How do I know if a plugin isn’t needed at all any longer? I’m happy to delete all those not needed. For example, was a particular plugin used ONLY for transferring date and so I don’t need them now? If so, how do I know which ones to delete?
Hi there!
Thank you for the update and I completely understand how this can start to feel overwhelming. You’re not alone in this, and it’s very reasonable to consider professional help if that feels like the safer option for you.
To answer your questions step by step: How to run the conflict test
If you decide to test this yourself, yes — this is the general process we’re suggesting:
- Deactivate all plugins except WooCommerce
- This helps confirm whether the issue is being caused by a plugin conflict.
- Deactivating plugins will not delete your content or settings.
- Temporarily switch to Storefront or Twenty Twenty-Four
- This is only for testing, to rule out any theme-related conflicts.
- You can switch back to your current theme immediately afterward without losing any pages or content.
- Test plugins one by one
- If the issue is resolved with only WooCommerce active, begin reactivating plugins one at a time, testing after each activation.
- When the issue returns, the last plugin activated is very likely the cause.
Should you deactivate all plugins at once or one by one?
- Start by deactivating all at once (except WooCommerce).
- Then reactivate them one by one to identify the exact plugin causing the issue.
If you decide to hire someone, I can recommend WooExperts and Codeable.io as options for getting professional help.
Thank you for the very detailed explanation what I need to do. I will do that this week. Is Storefront or Twenty Twenty-Four a plugin or how do I find those? Do they do the same thing, or do I just chos one? Thank you
Hi there!
Storefront and Twenty Twenty-Four are themes, not plugins.
You can find them by going to Appearance → Themes → Add New in your WordPress dashboard, then searching for either Storefront or Twenty Twenty-Four and installing one of them.
You only need to choose one of them for testing. They both serve the same purpose here, which is simply to check whether the issue is being caused by your current theme. There’s no functional difference for this test.
Switching themes temporarily will not delete any content or settings, and you can switch back to your original theme as soon as testing is complete.
Take your time testing this week, and feel free to update us once you’ve had a chance to run through the steps we’ll be here to help if you have any questions along the way.
OK, I’ll start playing with it this weekend. Cross your fingers! Thank you
Awesome! Looking forward to your update!
Great news!! It looks like it is working perfectly!! Yay!! Jakub at Octolize is a wizard and discovered I had accidentally left off 1 button and so it wasn’t working correctly. It all had to do with the USPS change of API. Thanks so so much for all of your work!! I’m hoping this is the end of the shipping errors!
Hi there!
Great to hear everything’s working perfectly now! Your feedback helps us improve and reach more users. If you have a moment, we’d be incredibly grateful if you could share your experience by leaving a review here:https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/woocommerce/reviews/#new-post
Thank you
