How to Schedule a Recurring Package Pickup with UPS

Small e-commerce merchants who work from home typically have to drop off multiple packages each day to ensure their customers receive their orders promptly. Fortunately, there are ways to streamline this process. For instance, UPS offers customers who ship items daily the option to schedule recurring package pickups at consistent times.

While most postal and courier services offer one-time package pickups, rescheduling repeatedly is inconvenient if you ship packages daily or almost daily. With UPS, however, you can set up a recurring pickup and choose the option that best fits your business.

Daily Pickup. This is a recurring pickup every weekday, Monday through Friday (except for UPS holidays falling on a weekday), at a designated time, for a flat weekly fee depending on your shipping volume. This pickup option is available for all UPS services and destinations.

Daily On-Route Pickup. It is a cost-saving alternative to Daily Pickup for businesses that ship daily but have a flexible shipping schedule. Rather than arriving at a scheduled pickup time, a UPS driver will pick up your shipment while making deliveries in your area. This pickup option is available Monday through Friday (except for UPS holidays falling on a weekday) for all UPS services and destinations. You will be charged a flat fee based on your shipping volume. This fee is lower than the Daily Pickup and UPS Smart Pickup (see below) fees.

UPS Smart Pickup. A pickup on weekdays (Monday through Friday, except for UPS holidays falling on a weekday) that is scheduled automatically when you create your first shipment of the day. If you don't have any packages to ship, no pickup will be scheduled, and the UPS driver will know not to stop by today. This pickup option is available for all UPS services and destinations. It costs a lower flat fee per week than the Daily Pickup fee.

Day-Specific Pickup. If you need to ship packages on multiple days but not every day, you can select up to four specific weekdays for pickup. Your packages will be picked up on those days at a scheduled time. This option is available for all UPS services and destinations, Monday through Friday, except for UPS holidays falling on a weekday. You will be charged a flat weekly fee depending on your shipping volume and the number of pickup days selected.

Saturday Pickup. This option is designed for businesses that ship over the weekend to ensure their customers receive their orders sooner. To request a Saturday pickup, you must have a weekday pickup scheduled.

To schedule recurring package pickups with UPS, create a UPS account if you don’t have one. Go to “Accounts and Payments”, find the account with which you would like to schedule a recurring pickup, and click “Actions”. Select “View Account Details”, then “Pickup Options”, and select your preferred option. Specify your preferred pickup times and leave driver instructions, if applicable, then click “Save”.

Don’t forget to print shipping labels beforehand to ensure a successful package pickup. You can purchase and print labels using your UPS account. However, some third-party platforms, such as PostageMaker, offer discounts that can help reduce your shipping costs, so it’s worth looking into them.