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Service points, also known as drop-off locations, are physical locations affiliated with one or more specific carriers. Parcels can be dropped off at these locations, and a driver will collect them and take them to be sorted at the carrier sorting hub. Parcels can also be delivered to service points as an alternative to door-to-door delivery. A service point can be a local post office, a brick-and-mortar store, or a fuel station. Service point delivery is an increasingly popular choice amongst e-commerce consumers, as it allows them to pick up their parcels at a time and location that’s convenient to them. The customer can see when their parcel is ready for collection via the tracking number.
You can activate tracking notifications via your Sendcloud account (see Tracking parcels) to automatically notify your customers when their parcel has been delivered and is awaiting collection from a service point.
This tutorial will cover the basics of creating a parcel using a service point delivery method.

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Step 1: Enable service point delivery in your Sendcloud account

Before you can begin using the API, you need to make that service points are enabled in your Sendcloud integration settings.
Tip: If service points are not enabled for your integration, you’ll see the following error message: “Service point support is not activated for this integration”.
  1. In the Sendcloud platform, go to your integration settings
  2. Find your API integration in the list and click Configure
  3. In the settings page for your API integration, enable service points
  4. Enable your desired carriers for service point delivery and save your changes
Screenshot showing how to enable service points in your Sendcloud integration settings

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Step 2: Retrieve a service point

You need to find the id for the service point you want to deliver to before you can specify it in your request to the Create a parcel or parcels endpoint. You can do so by making a GET request to the Retrieve a list of service points endpoint and specifying a country and a search radius based on a postcode or a GPS location.
Request method and URL
GET https://servicepoints.sendcloud.sc/api/v2/service-points?country=NL&address=5611%20EM&radius=1000
The response to the request above will list all available service points within a 1 km radius of the postal code. Note that:
  • A service point id is assigned to each of the service points which are returned, e.g. "id": 12345678. This is the identifier we will use when creating the parcel, so that it is delivered to this specific service point.
  • The carrier field corresponds to the carrier which is associated with this particular service point
  • The response includes the opening times for all of the service points which were returned

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Step 3: Find a service point delivery method

To ship a parcel to a service point, you need to select an appropriate shipping method. Now that we have a service point id, we can make a request to the Retrieve a list of shipping methods endpoint to retrieve a list of methods that support delivery to the service point.
Request method and URL
GET https://panel.sendcloud.sc/api/v2/shipping_methods?service_point_id=12345678
The response will contain a list of shipping methods which support delivery to the specified service point. Each shipping method has an id field, which we will use when creating the parcel.
Response body snippet
{
  "shipping_methods": [
    {
      "id": 123,
      "name": "Carrier X - Service Point Delivery"
      // ... other shipping method fields
    }
    // ... other shipping methods
  ]
}

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Step 4: Create the parcel

Now we have both the service point id and an appropriate shipping method id, we can create the parcel using the Create a parcel or parcels endpoint. To create a parcel which ships directly to a specific service point, make sure your request payload includes the following:
  1. The service point id in the to_service_point field
  2. The shipping method id for your service point delivery method in the shipment object
Request method and URL
POST https://panel.sendcloud.sc/api/v2/parcels
Request body snippet for a single parcel
{
  "parcel": {
    "shipment": {
      "id": 123
    },
    "to_service_point": 12345678
    // ... other parcel fields
  }
}