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I'm sure this is not the intended use case, but considering the trouble I've had trying to use UPS/Fedex/USPS to print shipping labels for my personal use (many of the websites suck), it'd be great to see a desktop app that used this API to find the lowest cost service, print you a label for it, and track your shipment.


I've had a very similar instance.

USPS ShipNClick, for example, has "fraud detection" that freezes all accounts you've ever logged into if it detects that you've created multiple accounts and switched between them. And worse, it's a silent detection, so after you've entered all the details for your shipping label(s), it gives a "Your payment method was declined" error. No warnings or anything, just a vague error message.

When you call USPS online support, they're aware of the issue but they can't unfreeze accounts without "escalating" the issue. You get a callback in a few days saying that your account was "cleared".


I've gotten that exact error - good to know what was going on :P


Actually! We do offer a web interface for this exact thing. Many of our customers are small businesses who don't have developers to integrate the API, so we built a dashboard for them to compare shipping prices, print labels, and track shipments. (You can also use it even if you're not a business)

You can see a small gif of it working under "How you make money" in the interview. https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/800/1*GDC26ygGdl49WKsb9Z...


Are you from Shippo? Would you mind if I contacted you directly to ask some questions? As it happens I'm in the process of comparing a few services like Shippo to purchase for a 3PL company and I'd love to be able to chat with someone. Email in my profile if you don't mind reaching out.


Yes, from Shippo here. Will shoot you an email. :)

edit: if anyone else would like to chat, sales@goshippo.com is the best place to get to us. That goes directly to a few of our inboxes, so we're get back to you in no time.



Yup that's it! (You'd need to sign up to access the app, but that's free to do.)


I'm currently working on that as we type: http://ezsend.it/

This is strictly for one-time shipments, targeted at the occasional sender. There are better solutions out there for small businesses.




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