Warning this article will only make sense to British people living in England, Scotland or Wales!
I like using eBay and PayPal. Today when I logged in, I noted that there was a new column added to my recent transactions on paypal. In this column were buttons saying ‘print postage label’. Now those of you who - like myself - use Royal Mail’s SmartStamp service will know that for a while now you have been able to print your own postage online. Now this paypal system is obviously a joint venture between Royal Mail and PayPal, but I have seen no coverage of it online from either party.
This paypal/royal mail system has a number of advantages and disadvantages over the SmartStamp option:
Advantages of Paypal postage
- You don’t have to print how much the postage cost - with Royal Mail, you have to print how much you paid for the postage, with this you don’t
- The money gets deducted straight from your paypal account. I really wish you could top up your SmartStamp account via paypal, would save having to withdraw the money to your bank first then paying them, unfortunately you can’t, but this PayPal Postage offering deducts the money straight from your account, sending the relevant amount to Royal Mail Group Online Postage - shipping_rmg_account_number_3@paypal.com
- There is a customer service phone number: 08707307191
- It prints a certificate of posting with it - Cool! It’s got the address already filled out, all you do is take that piece of paper along with your parcel to your post office, they stamp it, then if it goes missing (an increasing occurance with Royal Mail unfortunately) you have a proof of purchase and with a standard 32p stamp, are apparently covered up to £32! - It would be a lot better if this certificate of posting was optional though.
- If your printer runs out of ink half way through printing or it doesn’t print right for whatever reason, you are able to print another for free. With SmartStamp you have to post them your failed printouts with all these details and stuff, I can never be bothered. Too busy playing with PhotoShop and stuff!
Disadvantages of Paypal postage
- Have to print one at a time
- Takes up the whole page
- Has to print a certificate of posting with each one
- Print out has to include your address
- Buyer gets emailed as soon as you print your postage
- Process is quite time consuming
- Has to print the customer’s address with the postage
- Has to be posted within 1 working day (same as SmartStamp)
So quite a few major advantages there, but still lots of niggley disadvantages. I think that SmartStamp is still the best option, if they could incorporate the advantages of PayPal postage that I have listed above into SmartStamp then it would be great. I don’t really see any advantage of having your postage printing linked to your paypal transactions. I think they would be better making it easier to print the orders you receive from paypal, at the moment the options available are crap.
