You can add custom ship labels to shipment through the Client Portal.
This functionality can be used in cases where you are unable to obtain a carrier account number on which to ship and you only have a pdf file of the shipping label. For instance, Amazon may supply a pdf file of the shipping label, but will not provide you with an Amazon account number that would enable Mochila to generate the shipping label.
How do you add a custom ship label to a shipment?
- If you wish to load a custom label to a shipment, you must select the “custom label” option in the ship-method drop down when creating a new fulfillment request.
- Once you submit a fulfillment request for a custom label shipment, the shipment will sit in "Pending Custom Label" status until the custom label has been attached via the Client Portal. Once the label is attached, the shipment will automatically move to the "Ready to Ship" status.
- Any individual shipment can have only one custom ship label.
- You can add and/or change these custom labels in the Client Portal by searching for the shipment and adding a custom label (this will replace the current custom ship label attached to that shipment). Custom ship labels can be replaced until the shipment has shipped.
- The tracking number on the manual label will become the tracking number stored in Mochila.
- The required file format is png with pixel dimensions of EXACTLY 800 x 1200 (separate instruction for generating this image are below). The custom ship label will print on a 4x6 adhesive backed label and be placed on the outside of the shipping carton. See instructions below.
- Once you have loaded the file, you can view the attached label from within the shipment on the Client Portal
CREATING an 800 x 1200 PNG
Basic Steps: Open file, rotate image, crop image, resize image, resave image
Starting with a png, jpeg, or gif file:
- On a Mac
- Open in Preview
- Rotate if necessary.
- Click and drag to highlight area that should appear on the label (as you do this, you can see the dims, try to get as close to 800x1200 as possible)
- Once area is highlighted, go to Tools à Crop
- Resize the image by going to Tools à Adjust Size à uncheck the “scale proportionately” box
- Select Width = 800 and Height = 1200
- Save your new image. If you need to change the file format to png, then you may need to go to file à export à select format = png
- On Windows
- Open File In Paint
- Rotate if necessary.
- Go to Select àRectangular selection. Highlight area to be cropped à select crop.
- Then resize the image by going to Resize à select “by pixels” à uncheck the “maintain aspect ratio” box à Select Horizontal = 800 and Vertical = 1200
- Save your new image as a PNG.
Starting with a pdf file:
- On a Mac
- Open file in Preview
- Got to File à Export
- Save as PNG
- Follow instructions above for starting with a PNG
- On Windows
- Open file in Adobe Reader
- Use the snapshot tool to highlight the label
- Open MS Paint
- Paste the clipboard
- Follow instructions above for starting with a PNG
Other things to be aware of:
- The image must be EXACTLY Due to the way the image is translated to the printer, if the pixel dimensions are off even by 1 pixel the printed image will be distorted to the point where it is not legible.
- Please do not use screen shots to generate images, as the resolution may not be good enough for printing (note that screen shot is different than snapshot).
- You should avoid disproportionately scaling images as much as possible. Many images used for this purpose rely on a scannable barcode (such as the EDI labels). When you disproportionately scale an image, you may generate an image with an unscannable barcode. For example, forcing an image that is 800x1250 to 800x1200 generally results in scannable barcode, but forcing an 800x1400 image into an 800x1200 image may result in an un-scannable barcode. If your image does not include a barcode, then resizing proportionally is not as critical.