Shipping label (waybill)
What is a shipping label (waybill)?
A shipping label, or waybill, is the courier’s document for a parcel: it records who sends it, who receives it and where it goes, and carries the tracking number. It also states the weight, any cash-on-delivery amount, who pays for shipping and which extra services apply. A shop creates it by hand in the courier’s portal, or automatically from the order data, with nobody retyping anything.
Example
A homeware shop sends 30 parcels a day. Someone opens each order, copies the name, phone, office, weight and cash-on-delivery amount into the courier’s portal, then prints the label. Three minutes a parcel is 90 minutes a day, or 33 hours over 22 working days, spent retyping data the shop already holds.
One wrong digit costs money. Type €48.40 instead of €68.40 as the cash-on-delivery amount and the courier collects €20 less, leaving the shop to chase the difference. Get the phone number wrong and the courier cannot reach the recipient, the parcel often comes back, and the shop pays shipping both ways. The amounts are illustrative; the mechanics are not.
When the label is generated from the order, the data goes to the courier through its API: someone checks the order, presses one button, and a tracking number and printable label come back. Thirty parcels take minutes, and each number is saved on its order, ready for the dispatch email.
Why it matters for a business
The label is where a web order becomes a physical parcel. It fixes how much the courier collects, whether the customer may inspect the goods before paying, who pays for delivery and what value is declared. Anything entered wrongly is paid for by the shop: in returns, in lost cash, in a customer who does not order again.
Cash on delivery is still common in Bulgaria, so the courier is handling revenue, not just parcels. A tracking number stored on the order cuts the “where is my order?” calls and lets the courier’s payouts be checked order by order.
We connect the shop to any courier — Speedy, Econt, BoxNow, Sameday, DHL or another, you choose which: the rate is worked out in the basket, the buyer picks an office or a locker, and the waybill comes out of the admin panel. What else a build covers is on our online store development page.
What to ask
- Does a label come out for every delivery option you offer: to an address, an office, a locker?
- Is the label created from the order without retyping, and is the tracking number saved on it?
- Do the cash-on-delivery amount, the inspect-before-paying option and who pays for shipping come from settings rather than memory?
- Can labels print in one batch, on an office or a label printer?
- If the courier’s API is down, can a parcel still go out by hand without losing the link to the order?
- Whose name is the courier account in? It should be yours, so the contract and shipping history stay with you.