Tracked letters for ShippingEasy orders

How do I connect ShippingEasy to PigeonTrail?

You copy two values from ShippingEasy and paste them into PigeonTrail. Sign in to ShippingEasy, open Settings and choose API Credentials, where ShippingEasy shows your account's API Key and API Secret. Copy both, paste them on the Connections page in PigeonTrail and choose Connect ShippingEasy.

We check the keys with ShippingEasy by reading the list of your stores before we save anything, and we keep the keys encrypted. If you disconnect, PigeonTrail forgets them. ShippingEasy gives us no way to switch the keys off on its side, so ask ShippingEasy's support team if you want new ones.

How do ShippingEasy orders get into PigeonTrail?

Press Import from ShippingEasy on the Orders tab of the Send page, and PigeonTrail brings in the orders that are ready for shipment across all of your ShippingEasy stores, each one once. It uses the order's shipping address and leaves out orders that ship to more than one address, which would need more than one letter. Each address is checked against USPS data before anything prints, and an address USPS can't match is flagged so you can fix it with the buyer. PigeonTrail mails only to addresses in the United States.

ShippingEasy lets us look back three months, so an order that has been ready for shipment without any change for longer than that won't come in. You can also let new orders come in by themselves. On the Connections page, tick Automatically pull new orders every 15 minutes on the ShippingEasy card, and PigeonTrail checks your account every 15 minutes, so the orders are waiting when you sit down to print.

When the buyer chose a tracked shipping method such as Priority Mail, Ground Advantage, Media Mail, UPS or FedEx, the order goes straight to a separate Packages list instead of your letters. Orders of $50 or more go there too, with a file you upload to Pirate Ship to buy Ground Advantage labels, and you can change that $50 line in Settings or turn it off.

How do I print tracked envelopes?

Pick the orders, choose what to print on and print from your own printer. PigeonTrail prints #10, #9, #6 3/4, A7 and 6 x 9 envelopes, Avery 5163 address sheets, 4 x 2 and 4 x 6 thermal labels, and a window slip that folds into a #10 window envelope. Each one carries the buyer's address and a USPS Intelligent Mail barcode in the places USPS's machines read them, with your return address and, if you like, your logo. You add a Forever stamp, which is $0.82 for a 1 ounce letter, and drop the letters in the mail.

The barcode only gets scanned when the letter goes through USPS's sorting machines, so keep it flat and flexible. Our letter checker tells you whether a mailer counts as a letter, whether it is machinable and how many stamps it needs.

Who marks the orders shipped in ShippingEasy?

You do. ShippingEasy's API lets other apps read orders and send new ones in, and its own documentation describes the usual way of working as sending orders in through the API and then processing and shipping them in ShippingEasy's web interface. It has no call that marks an order shipped, so PigeonTrail never changes anything in your ShippingEasy account.

When you print, PigeonTrail tells you once how many of the letters came from ShippingEasy, so you know which orders to mark shipped there. Orders you send as packages through Pirate Ship are the same, and you add their tracking numbers in ShippingEasy yourself.

What does my buyer see?

Every letter gets a tracking page with your shop's logo and colors, a map of the route so far and the day USPS expects it to arrive. When the order carries the buyer's email address, we email your buyer at the first USPS scan with a link to that page. If you're on Pro, our emails come from your shop's name, and your buyer hears from you when the letter is mailed, when it's almost there and when USPS marks it delivered.

A letter's scans come from USPS's sorting plants, and its delivered event is USPS's estimate from the carrier's route rather than a scan at the mailbox. Our guide to what each USPS scan means explains what your buyer will see.

What if my stores are also connected to PigeonTrail?

Each sale still prints one letter. When an order from ShippingEasy is already in PigeonTrail through your own Shopify, eBay, BigCommerce or WooCommerce connection, whichever connection brought it in first keeps it and the other import skips it. Shopify and eBay order ids are unique, so they match on their own. BigCommerce and WooCommerce count their order numbers per store, so PigeonTrail matches them only when ShippingEasy holds a single BigCommerce store, or when the WooCommerce store in ShippingEasy has the same address as the one you connected to us. If your stores repeat order numbers in other ways, connect either ShippingEasy or the store, but not both.