Alternative delivery locations
API interface PickPost / My Post 24
Illustration: a customer at the My Post 24 terminal
The advantages for you
- Convenience and flexibility for your customers
- Secure posting upon presentation of ID or access using a QR code
- Easy integration into your web shop
Here’s how it works
If you integrate PickPost and My Post 24 into your shop, your customers will enjoy the following advantages:
- Map selection means the consignment is automatically addressed in the background to an access point using the PickPost service or My Post 24 terminal.
- Customers no longer need to provide their User ID.
- Customers who have not yet registered for PickPost or My Post 24 will be registered automatically and can use the service immediately.
To collect the deposited consignment, they just need to show ID and the consignment number at an access point offering the PickPost service. The customer receives a QR code so they can check out their consignment themselves at a My Post 24 terminal.
Prices
The interface is free of charge. You only invest in connecting it to your system.
Who is this service for & preconditions
The API interface PickPost / My Post 24 is suitable for companies with high consignment volumes that want to offer their customers flexible receipt of orders. A prerequisite is a billing relationship with Swiss Post.
Procedure for API integration
Three steps are necessary to integrate the two components – the map application and API interface PickPost / My Post 24 – into your online shop for alternative delivery locations.
First step: integration of location selection
You offer your customers the choice of alternative delivery or collection points during the checkout process via a map application. Your customers choose a suitable collection point with the corresponding service that is offered at this access point.
- To do so, obtain a licence for a map application (Google Maps) and integrate the Swiss Post “Location search” map application – see details at Swiss Post “Location search” API map application – or
- if you have your own map with your own locations, then you can supplement this by requesting the Swiss Post collection points as location data via the Digital Commerce API and displaying the collection points on your map.
Second step: interaction of the interface with your customer’s location selection in the online shop’s checkout process
After your customer selects the delivery address on the map, the customer number is retrieved. You will receive what we call the User IDs (customer number) that you require in addressing to allow us to notify your customer when the consignment is ready for collection.
The purpose of the call to the Digital Commerce API PickPost / My Post 24 is to retrieve the PickPost/My Post 24 customer identification and customer status.
In both cases, you will also be informed of the customer’s status (NONE, MAIL, REGISTERED_MAIL or SUISSE-ID). This information is primarily important for delivery to My Post 24 terminals. The status indicates whether Swiss Post has already verified the customer’s identity. MAIL, REGISTERED_MAIL and SUISSE-ID can be deemed equivalent.
To ensure the consignment is delivered reliably to the customer, the PickPost/My Post 24 User ID must be integrated into the delivery address (from the map) and transmitted electronically together with the consignment data (see API barcode in chapter 8, Barcode and DataTransfer manuals, such as customer manual/overview point 2.2 PickPost and annex 1, p. 11). Important: the keyword PickPost or MyPost24 must be entered along with the UserID in the Name2 field.
Third step: creation of the parcel label
After installing a map and the API PickPost / My Post 24, the PickPost and My Post 24 services and place of receipt selection will be seamlessly integrated into your checkout process.
Now you need to create the parcel label (direct addressing) for mailing your goods.
A precondition for this is
- that you can distinguish between home/invoicing addresses and delivery addresses in your online shop checkout process.
- and that you have a separate checkout process in each case.
The User ID (customer number from the retrieval via the API module PickPost/My Post 24) is now part of the order (shipment) and therefore needs to be called by you each time an order is placed.
Other technical details and examples of correct addresses under direct addressing for consignments to a PickPost or My Post 24 location/collection point can be found on our Developer Site in Section 7 PickPost / My Post 24, in the technical specifications for the API interface PickPost / My Post 24.
More information
More information on integration can be found here: