Shipping With USPS: Schedule a Pickup for Free

August 20, 2021

by Kelly Berbert

Scheduling a free USPS pickup through EasyPost is a smart way to streamline your shipping process without incurring extra costs. With the convenience of free pickups, you can save time and keep your operations running smoothly.

Add efficiency and convenience to your shipping process

In all of our conversations with thousands of ecommerce businesses, we know this much: maximizing efficiency and minimizing time is key. Shippers continue to iterate on their operations to get the most out of them, and many also rely on EasyPost to help ensure exactly that.

We work with key shipping partners to make the best shipping services available. We also provide ecommerce businesses with the most reliable shipping API on the market, ensuring that our customers can get their shipments to their destinations as quickly as possible with less worry and greater ease.

One of our top recommendations for businesses looking to increase shipping efficiency? If you’re shipping with USPS, schedule pickups for free and save yourself the trip to the post office.

Free USPS pickup service

One way that our customers streamline their operations is by scheduling a USPS free pickup through the EasyPost API. Whereas most parcel carriers will charge a pickup fee, the USPS offers a completely free pickup option. This means that a local mail carrier will retrieve your packages from your doorstep and insert them into the mailstream for you at no extra cost.

With USPS’s Package Pickup service, you can schedule a pickup for a designated day, including the next day, at the same time your mail is delivered by your letter carrier. Regardless of how many mailpieces are being picked up, there is no additional charge. All you need to do is ensure that the mailpieces have prepaid postage and are completely ready to be mailed.

How to schedule free pickups through EasyPost

Free pickups are a highlight of using USPS that you don’t get with other mail carriers. Almost all of our USPS customers utilize this service for its convenience and the fact that it is free. Especially because EasyPost makes it simple to use, is there a reason not to?

Using our shipping API, you can schedule pickups quickly and easily. Any relevant customer information will be automatically pre-filled by our software and you’ll be guided to provide any other necessary details to properly schedule and confirm your pickup.

Are you new to EasyPost? Talk to us about getting started!

Already a customer but would like more information? Feel free to email us at support@easypost.com. We are here to help!

What if I need a pickup at a specific time?

If you would like to schedule a pickup for a specific date and within a specific timeframe that does not coincide with your regular visit by the USPS mail carrier, you can use USPS’s Pickup on Demand^® service for a pickup fee.

You can schedule this service directly with USPS through their website. Again, there is no limit to the number of mailpieces. Simply specify the time, place, day, and approximate volume per pickup, and a USPS mail carrier will pick up your packages. For more information on scheduling a Pickup on Demand^® service with USPS, including restrictions and fees, visit the USPS website.

Benefits of the USPS pickup service

This offer allows shippers to skip trips to the post office entirely. There’s no loading of trucks, no driving to the post office, no waiting in frustrating lines, and no unloading your packages—all of this is taken care of for you by the USPS mail carrier.

Scheduling pickups in advance also allows you to get ahead of your operations so you don’t need to leave anything to the last minute. Plus, there are no shipping minimums or maximums; whether you’re shipping 50 or 300 packages, the mail carrier will pick them up without any additional cost.

With the time and effort saved through USPS pickups, businesses can leave pickups to their USPS mail carrier and continue to make progress on other operations as smoothly and efficiently as possible.

Explore our guide to shipping with USPS for more tips and benefits.

Can I schedule pickups with UPS, FedEx, or another carrier with EasyPost?

You’re in luck. EasyPost supports package pickups for a variety of carriers, including the following:

Asendia Europe
Canada Post
Canpar
DHL Express
Endicia
FedEx
GSO
Lasership
LSO
Ontrac
Purolator
UPS
USPS

Schedule package pickups the easy way

EasyPost is a preferred partner of the USPS. If you want more information on how USPS services could benefit you, check out this post on making return shipping easier.