Shipping Strategies
Etsy
Automations
Last Updated
June 25, 2023
5 min.
Written By
Krišs Ģērmanis
Discover how Etsy shipping automation can save hours of repetitive work. Learn how to automatically complete missing shipment details, create shipping labels, and streamline your shipping workflow.
Automate repetitive shipping tasks by filling in missing phone numbers, email addresses, package details, and customs information.
Create shipping labels automatically as soon as Etsy orders are imported into Swotzy.
Reduce manual work by using automation rules that run for every new order.
Prepare international shipments faster with automatic HS codes, country of origin, customs declarations, and HTS codes for US shipments.
Automatically choose the best carrier based on your preferred price, delivery speed, or custom rules.
Complete Etsy orders with tracking automatically after the shipping label is created.
No coding or monthly fees—shipping automations are available with every free Swotzy account.
Etsy is built to make buying easy. It asks shoppers for as little as possible, and it keeps the conversation between buyer and seller inside its own messages. That is good for your shop.
Carriers work the other way around. A courier needs a fixed set of fields on every shipment and will not accept a parcel without them. There is no negotiation and no exception.
So Etsy hands you an order that a carrier will not take, and you fill in the difference manually. Then the next order arrives and you do it again.
Swotzy closes that gap. You tell the platform once what belongs in each missing field, and after that an incoming Etsy order turns into a finished shipping label on its own. Nothing to type, nothing to copy across. The hours you currently spend repeating the same data entry go back into the business.
This guide shows which fields Etsy leaves empty, why carriers insist on them, and which rule fills each one.
Why Etsy orders end up being processed manually
An Etsy order does not include everything a carrier asks for. This is not a problem with your shop. Buyers and sellers talk to each other inside Etsy, so Etsy never had a reason to collect the contact details a courier asks for.
Each missing field is small. The problem is that the same fields are missing every time.
Etsy does not collect a phone number
Etsy has no phone number field at checkout, and no setting adds one. If you need a number, Etsy tells you to message the buyer and ask for it.
Most couriers require a recipient phone number, especially on international shipments. It is how the driver reaches the buyer when a delivery goes wrong. So the field is required, it is empty on every order, and nothing in your shop settings can change that.
The buyer email address is restricted
Etsy limits which apps can read the buyer email address through its API. Access is given case by case, and shipping platforms are not included automatically.
The result is the same as with the phone number. Even when the order has an email address, it may not reach the platform where you create the shipment.
Other fields depend on your listings
Everything apart from contact details comes from your listings. If the value is in your shop, it arrives with the order. If it is not, the field arrives empty.
Item weight is the most common example. Etsy only asks for weight on listings that use calculated shipping. If your shop uses fixed shipping prices, Etsy never asked you for a weight, so your orders arrive without one.
Weight and size also belong to the listing, not to the variation. One listing that sells a small print and a large print has a single weight for both.
Why this adds up
None of these fields is hard to fill in. A phone number takes a few seconds. A weight takes a few seconds.
The problem is that it happens on every order. The better your shop sells, the more time it takes. It feels fine at five orders a day and much less fine at fifty, usually at the time of year when you have the least time to spare.
Automation does not remove the fields. It fills them once, in advance, for every order that follows.
What carriers need, and what Swotzy can fill in for you
Carriers ask for the same information whichever platform you use, and the list grows with distance. A parcel sent within the Baltics needs the least. A parcel sent to another EU country also needs item details. A parcel sent outside the EU needs customs data on top of that. A parcel sent to the United States needs one change to that customs data.
Every field below can be filled automatically in Swotzy. Nothing in this list has to be typed twice.
Group | Fields | When it is needed |
|---|---|---|
Recipient | Name, address, city, postal code, country, phone, email | Every shipment |
Package | Length, width, height, weight | Every shipment |
Item details | Title, quantity, price, weight, country of origin, HS code | Outside the Baltics, and inside the Baltics on express services |
Customs | Who pays duties and taxes, declaration details | Outside the EU customs union |
United States | A 10 digit HTS code instead of the HS code | Shipments to the United States |
Compare this list with your own shop. Any field your listings already have arrives on its own. Any field they do not have is one you fill in manually today, and one a rule can fill instead.
How to Automate Shipment Creation goes through the same fields one by one and names the rule that fills each one. Use it to find the gaps in your own shop before you start.
How automation rules work on Swotzy
Automation rules are where the repeated work disappears. Every rule you add removes one decision from every order that follows. Set the phone number once and you never enter a phone number again. Set the weight logic once and weight stops being something you think about. Add enough rules and the whole sequence goes away: the order arrives, the label appears, you pack the parcel and send it.
The time this gives back builds up fast. Whatever filling in those fields costs you on one order, multiply it by every order you will ship this year. One setup session removes all of it, and it keeps working through your busiest weeks, when manual input hurts the most.
It also costs nothing. Automation rules come with a free Swotzy account. There is no monthly fee, no separate plan to upgrade to, and no limit on how many rules you set.
What you can automate
The phone number and email address Etsy does not send
Package weight and size, even when your listings do not have them
Country of origin and HS codes for international parcels
Who pays customs duties and taxes
Carrier choice and label creation
A rule has two parts. The action is what happens. The conditions decide which orders it happens to. You set the rule once on your connected Etsy shop, and it runs on every matching order after that.
Rules are read from the bottom of the list upwards, so the rule at the bottom has the highest priority. Several rules can apply to the same order if each one does something different. If two rules do the same thing, the first one wins. Keep general rules near the top and specific ones at the bottom.
Priority matters more than it sounds once you have several rules running, and it is the most common reason a rule does not do what a seller expected. Link: What Are Store Automation Rules? explains how actions, conditions and priority fit together, and it is worth reading before you build your first rule.
Phone number and email address
This is the quickest change for most Etsy shops, because it removes a step from every order.
You set a default phone number and a default email address. Both rules only fill the field when it is empty, so if an order does arrive with real contact details, those are kept. Most sellers use their own shop contact details here, so that a courier can reach someone if needed.
There is a fast way and a flexible way to set each one. The fast way is a single default field. The flexible way is a rule with your own conditions, for example a different number for international orders. Both are covered in How to Automatically Fill In a Missing Phone Number and How to Automatically Fill In a Missing Email Address.
Package weight and size
If your listings have item weights, Swotzy can add them up for each order. If they do not, you set one standard package that every shipment uses.
Adding weights up only works when every item in the order has a weight. If one item is missing a weight, the order gets no weight at all. Many Etsy listings have no weight, so the simple fix is a rule that gives every item a weight first.
Either way, use real numbers. If your weight and size do not match what the carrier measures, you may be charged the difference later.
Which guide you need depends on your listings. If they already have weights, set up How to Automatically Calculate Package Weight from Shipment Items and use How to Automatically Set an Item Weight to cover the ones that do not. If your listings have no weights at all, How to Automatically Set a Package Size is the one to follow.
Country of origin and HS codes
Item details are needed as soon as a parcel leaves the Baltics, and Etsy listings rarely have them. Without them, every international order stops and waits for you.
Country of origin is usually the same for everything you make, so one default is enough.
HS codes depend on the product. One default code works if your shop sells a single type of item. If you sell several types, you can set different codes by item title.
Look up the correct codes for your products before you set the rules. Swotzy applies the code you give it and does not choose one for you.
How to Automatically Set a Country of Origin shows how to set the country for every item.
How to Automatically Set an HS Code shows how to set one code for the whole shop, and how to set a different code for each type of product.
Customs for parcels leaving the EU
Two more things are needed when a parcel leaves the EU customs union. Both can be set once.
The first is who pays the customs duties and taxes. If the buyer pays them when the parcel arrives, that is DAP. If you pay them instead, that is DDP. There is no default, so choose the one that fits how you sell.
The second is the customs declaration statement, which a rule can add to every international shipment. Swotzy creates the commercial invoice for you.
Set the payer once in How to Automatically Set Who Pays Customs Duties and Taxes, and write your standard wording once in How to Automatically Add a Declaration Statement.
One change for the United States
Parcels to the United States need a 10 digit HTS code for every item, instead of the shorter HS code used elsewhere. A separate rule handles this, so orders to the United States get the longer code and everything else keeps the standard one.
Swotzy checks that the code is the right length and format. It does not check that the code matches your product, so look the codes up before you set the rule.
The setup is the same as for HS codes with one added condition, and How to Automatically Set an HTS Code for Shipments to the USA walks through it. If you are not sure why the longer code is now required, US customs and de minimis rule change article explains what changed at the US border.
Insurance and extra services
Insurance and services such as signature on delivery can also be added by rule. A high value order then gets the protection you want without anyone having to remember.
Both are set up the same way as the rules above, with conditions deciding which orders they apply to. See How to Automatically Add Insurance to a Shipment and How to Automatically Add an Additional Service.
The rule that removes the last manual step
Everything above exists so that this rule can run.
A carrier selection rule chooses the carrier and service for you, based on the cheapest price or the fastest delivery. You can compare everything available to you, or limit the comparison to certain carriers and services. You can add conditions too, so orders to different countries or above a certain weight go a different way.
When an order arrives with every required field already filled in, the label is created automatically. There is nothing for you to open or type.
When a field is still missing, no label is created. The shipment appears in Shipment Overview with the status Action Needed and waits for you.
That status is helpful, because it names the field that is missing. Add a rule that fills that field, and every future order with the same gap will produce a label without stopping.
This is the rule worth setting up last, once the fields it depends on are covered. How to Automatically Select a Carrier and Service covers the price and speed options and how to limit which carriers are compared.
Completing the order on Etsy
Once the label exists, the order still has to be completed in your Etsy shop. On Etsy, completing an order and adding the tracking number are the same step. You choose a ship date, enter the carrier and the tracking number, and the order is marked complete. The buyer then sees the order as shipped and can follow the parcel from that tracking number.
Done manually, that means copying a tracking number from one screen to another on every order.
You do not have to. Press Fulfil store order in Swotzy and the tracking information goes to Etsy, which completes the order there. You can also set a rule that does it automatically once the label is created, so the order closes without you touching it.
This works in one direction. If you complete an order on Etsy instead, Swotzy does not receive that.
Three things automation cannot decide for you
A rule applies the value you gave it. It cannot judge whether that value is correct, so three decisions stay yours.
Weight and size. A rule uses the numbers you entered. The carrier charges based on what it measures, so if the two do not match you may be charged the difference.
HS and HTS codes. You choose the code that describes your product. Swotzy checks the format, not the meaning.
The phone number. A default keeps labels moving, but it is not the buyer's number. If a courier genuinely needs to reach the buyer, message them on Etsy and ask for one.
Set it up once on Swotzy
Every carrier on Swotzy is available directly. You do not need a separate agreement with any of them.
Create a free account and connect your Etsy shop, and your orders import on their own. If you sell in more than one place, Swotzy also connects to Shopify, WooCommerce, PrestaShop, Magento, and a direct API, with separate rules for each store.
You only set the rules up once. After that you stop typing phone numbers, weights and HS codes, and creating a shipment means printing the label, or doing nothing at all if your carrier selection rule already handled it.
No contracts, no minimum volumes, no monthly fees.
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