Register a Merchant as a Known Shipper

HTTP Request

POST /v2/developers/{developerId}/merchants/registration

Summary

This operation registers a merchant as a known shipper with Pitney Bowes and provides the merchant with a unique Shipper ID. Use this operation if you use a Pitney Bowes Bulk Postage Account to manage funds on behalf of your merchants. A merchant must have a physical U.S. address to obtain a Shipping ID. Merchants cannot use P.O. Boxes as addresses.

To learn more about Bulk Postage Accounts, please contact Client Support at ClientSupportTechServices@pb.com. See also Merchant Enrollment Models.

Request URLs

Sandbox: https://shipping-api-sandbox.pitneybowes.com/shippingservices/v2/developers/{developerId}/merchants/registration
Production: https://shipping-api.pitneybowes.com/shippingservices/v2/developers/{developerId}/merchants/registration

Path Parameter

Name

Description

developerId


Required. Your Pitney Bowes developer ID.

Request Headers

Name


Description

Authorization

Required. OAuth token generated using the Generate an OAuth Token API.

Content-Type

Required. The media type of the request entity. Set this to application/json.

X-PB-UnifiedErrorStructure

Recommended. Set this to true to use the standard error object if an error occurs.

Request Elements

Name

Data Type

Description

name

String

Required. The merchant’s first and last name.

email

String

Required. The email address.

company

String

The name of the company. The company field is required if the merchant is incorporated. It should be left out if the merchant is not incorporated.

Include this field only if the merchant is incorporated.

Required if the merchant is incorporated.

phone

String

Required. A valid 10-digit number. The string should contain 10 numeric characters and no additional characters. For example: "8442566444"

addressLines

Array[String]

Required. Street address, including apartment number if applicable. You can specify up to 3 address lines. The address cannot be a P.O. Box.

cityTown

String

The city or town name.

Required if postalCode is absent.

stateProvince

String

The state or province name. For US addresses, use the 2-letter state code.

Required if postalCode is absent. In some cases where cityTown is a unique name within the country, this can be left out even if postalCode is absent, but the best practice is to include this field when postalCode absent.

postalCode

String

The Postal or ZIP code. For US addresses, either the 5-digit or 9-digit ZIP code.

Required if cityTown and stateProvince are absent.

countryCode

String

Required. Two-character country code from the ISO country list.

Response Elements

Name

Data Type

Description

postalReportingNumber

String

The unique ID used to identify the merchant. This value is the merchant’s Shipper ID. You must specify Shipper ID when creating a shipment.

developerId

String

Your Pitney Bowes developer ID.

fullName

String

The merchant’s full name.

company

String

The merchant’s company.

email

String

The merchant’s email address.

registeredDate

Number

The date the merchant’s account was created, shown as milliseconds since the Unix Epoch. You can convert the date to human-readable form by rounding from milliseconds to seconds and then using the Unix timestamp conversion algorithm, or by using a website that converts milliseconds since the Epoch.

deactivatedDate

String

This field is null.

paymentAccountNumber

String

The identifier for the PB Postage Account.

enterpriseAccount

String

An enterprise account number associated with the merchant.

subscriptionAccount

String

Any subscription account that the merchant might have.

merchantStatus

String

The merchant’s status. This is set to ACTIVE.

merchantStatusReason

String

This field is null.

merchantType

String

This is set to KNOWN_SHIPPER.

paymentServicesAccountId

String

This field is null.

paymentServicesAccountIdActive

Boolean

This is set to false.

Sample Request

curl -X POST ".../v2/developers/12345678/merchants/registration" \
-H "Authorization: Bearer <oauth_token>" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "X-PB-UnifiedErrorStructure: true" \
-d '
{
    "name": "James Wright",
    "email": "james@example.com",
    "company": "Supplies Inc",
    "phone": "6070000000",
    "addressLines": [
        "1 Atwell Rd",
        "Unit 302"
    ],
    "cityTown": "Cooperstown",
    "stateProvince": "NY",
    "postalCode": "13326",
    "countryCode": "US"
}'

Sample Response

{
    "postalReportingNumber": "902455555",
    "developerId": "12345678",
    "fullName": "James Wright",
    "company": "Supplies Inc",
    "email": "james@example.com",
    "registeredDate": 1600705393223,
    "deactivatedDate": null,
    "paymentAccountNumber": "1234567",
    "enterpriseAccount": "2345678",
    "subscriptionAccount": "3456789",
    "merchantStatus": "ACTIVE",
    "merchantStatusReason": null,
    "merchantType": "KNOWN_SHIPPER",
    "paymentServicesAccountId": null,
    "paymentServicesAccountIdActive": false
}

Error Codes

For a list of all error codes returned by the Ecommerce APIs, please see Error Codes.