The essential element of smooth e-commerce fulfillment is shipping of goods to the doorstep of the customer. Accurate tracking for the ordered product is an added advantage – giving your customers accurate and timely information about the delivery of their order by providing international package tracking is one of the useful things you can do to improve customer experience with your brand.
How does shipment tracking work?
Tracking is about locating packages in real time as they travel from their point of origin to their destination. This is usually done using tracking numbers provided by courier services; most retailers share these with their customers in a shipping confirmation email so they can see where their packages are at all times. Tracking is such an important part of fulfilling eCommerce orders that eBay’s policy requires retailers to offer tracking information on 90% of their shipments in order to become a top-rated seller.
Order & stock management for sellers and fulfillment centers
Automate your inventory and order process with Waredock
What are the best package tracking sites?
Parcel Monitor lets you track your UPS, DHL, DSV and other carriers packages with your tracking number.
Postal Ninja claims to combines tracking systems of more than 540 postal and courier services
How do I track international packages?
Tracking is all about knowing the location of the product while it is in transit from point A to point B, the target destination. One of the main benefits of tracking system is that it prevents the package from getting lost or misplaced; it helps to track them well and avoid cases of loss or mishandling.
The delivering company usually provides tracking ID for the product you ordered; most retailers share it with their customers in a shipping confirmation email so that they can always be aware of their packages. International tracking is no longer something left to courier and delivery companies. Online retailers are actively involved in tracking international shipments, mainly because it offers many benefits, including staying ahead of the competition and providing peace of mind and improved service to their customers.
Tracking international shipments varies from country to country, depending on their scanning capabilities and agreements with other countries’ postal departments. Regardless of whether FedEx, USPS or UPS is sending the shipment, most courier services offer different levels of tracking for international packages. All you have to do is log on to the courier’s official website, enter your barcode or the tracking ID that you provided when you placed your order, and know where the package is.
Tracking number formats by carrier
USPS
The most common USPS Tracking Number Format is 20 digits (Like 9999 9999 9999 9999 9999), or a combination of 13 thirteen alphabetic and numeric characters, typically starting with 2 Two alphabets, following by 9 Nine digits, and ending by “US” United States (e.g., EA 999 999 999 US).
UPS tracking
UPS Tracking number is eighteen alpha-numeric characters. It starts with ‘1Z’ and ends with check digit. For example, 1Z 999 AA1 01 2345 6784. Checkdigit shows whether UPS tracking number contains a mistype
UPS Tracking Numbers Formatsis like this:-
- Start with “1Z”:- 1Z9999999999999999
- Start With Number:- 999999999999
- Start With “T”:- 9999999999
- 9 Number:- 999999999
UPS will also track the following kinds of tracking numbers, which include from seven to 20 characters:
- Delivery Order/Sub-PRO Number: Less-Than-Truckload (LTL) and Truckload (TL) child Transport tracking numbers
- House Air Waybill: Used for air shipment transit
- House Bill of Lading: Used for ocean shipping transportation
- PRO Number: Used for surface freight transportation
- UPS InfoNotice: A bar-coded notice, which includes a 12-digit number, given on the first delivery in select countries
- UPS Service Notice: An opinion given on the first delivery attempt in choose countries.
Royal mail tracking
Royal mail tracking number (reference number) is between 9 and 27 characters long. Your sender should give you the reference number and it can be inserted via the Royal mail Track and Trace service.
FedEx tracking
In the U.S FedEx customer can track their shipment by order or tracking number. For example customers can use e-mail to conveniently get the status of up to 30 FedEx shipments or FedEx Office orders.
You can track parcel with tracking number which usually has 12 digits or 15 digits. Some other less common formats may also exist, such as 20 digits and 22 digits.
Hermes tracking
If you are wondering where is your Hermes package or if you want to follow your shipments then Hermes Live Tracking is a great tool for those in the UK. For that you just enter the tracking number into the tracker.
So what does the Hermes shipment number look like? It is the 16 character code that you get from your parcel sender. Retailers usually send this to you by email with information about your delivery.
Tracking Hermes shipments is also possible in Germany for example. For that use the local “Hermes paket tracking” engine. In France, Hermes collaborates with Mondial.
DHL tracking
For shipments sent from Europe tracking numbers are usually 10 or 20 digits. Shipments sent from the U.S. have tracking numbers that start with GM followed by 15–21 digits.
Examples: SGAGS292388, CNAOG0000077749, RX444172478DE, GM275322484009027685
DHL Paket: A/C/E/L/R/S/U/V+nine digits+DE, fourteen digits+DE, ten/twelve/sixteen/twenty/twenty-two digits, JD+thirteen/seventeen digits.
Example: JD014600004291022110
DHL eCommerce tracking
eCommerce tracking is offered via several official DHL websites that provide DHL eCommerce/DHL eCommerce.
- webtrack.dhlglobalmail.com — most popular and oldest one, provides all tracking information in several languages,
- www.logistics.dhl — provides information about sender, recipient, declared value + other useful parcel attributes together with tracking events;
- dhlecommerce.asia — mainly for packages sent to/from Asian countries, provides tracking in English, Malaysian, Vietnamise, Thai and Chinese;
To track DHL eCommerce shipments for example in France, Italy, Spain, USA, Canada, United Kingdom or Singapore you can use their global portal. DHL Express tracking in Germany is available here.
Take Your eCommerce Business Global by Tracking International Shipments
Waredock operates a cross-border fulfilment network and partners with a number of reputable couriers to offer a variety of service options that have tracking for international shipments. If you want to know how to track an international package and offer your customers the transparency they desire, sign up for a free Waredock account now.
