OrderCup Review: Shipping Software for Ecommerce Beginners
Meaghan has provided content and guidance for indie retailers as the editor for a number of retail publications and a speaker at trade shows. She is Fit Small Business’s authority on retail and ecommerce.
Katie-Jay aims to put answers in the hands of small business owners by leveraging over 10 years of retail and hospitality experience. With a background in gemology, she specializes in jewelry and luxury ecommerce.
This article is part of a larger series on Retail Management.
OrderCup is web-based shipping software that integrates with ecommerce platforms and shopping carts to streamline order fulfillment and shipping. It’s designed for small to midsize businesses (SMBs) with plans ranging from free to $180 per month.
In our evaluation of the best shipping software for small businesses, OrderCup ranked No. 5 with a score of 3.89 out of 5. It earned points for its international shipping capabilities, discounted rates, and exceptional customer service, but its rudimentary features make it better for ecommerce newcomers than complex operations.
OrderCup
Overall Score:
3.89 / 5
What We Like
- Solid free starter plan
- Exceptional customer support seven days per week
- Free pickups, shipping supplies, and global address verification
- Highly rated in user reviews
What's Missing
- Rudimentary features
- Narrow reporting capabilities
- Limited scalability
When to Use
- Low-volume and small-scale sellers: OrderCup delivers simple features and helpful shipping perks.
- Ecommerce beginners: Best-in-class customer service with affordable setup and consulting.
- International shippers: OrderCup supports a wide range of global origins and offers the best international shipping discounts.
When to Use an Alternative
- Dropshippers: Ordoro delivers better functionality for managing dropshipped orders.
- Sellers seeking a multipurpose tool: OrderCup is a rudimentary shipping solution, while Ordoro has more features.
- Fast-growing businesses: We recommend ShipStation.
OrderCup offers a solid free plan for low-volume shippers that makes it accessible to businesses sticking to a tight fulfillment budget. It also provides industry-leading customer support with affordable setup and consulting services, making it a good fit for ecommerce beginners new to shipping. For international sellers, OrderCup supports shipping with its core carriers from a wide range of global origins, plus better discounts from UK Mail and DX than its competitors.
Functions such as email marketing, inventory management, and setting user permissions are very rudimentary on OrderCup’s platform, so it’s not an effective multipurpose tool and may be a poor fit for complex or high-volume operations. Fast-growing businesses may also want to seek an alternative due to OrderCup’s restrictive list of native integrations and lack of an application programming interface (API).
OrderCup Deciding Factors
Supported Business Types | SMBs, startups, ecommerce stores, retail stores, direct-to-consumer (DTC) sellers, business-to-business (B2B) sellers, resellers, and subscription box services |
Standout Features |
|
Carrier Discounts | United States Postal Service (USPS) Commercial Base Pricing; discounted USPS, DHL, UK Mail, and DX rates |
Free Starter Plan | 50 shipments per month |
Pricing | From $25 per month for 500 shipments to $180 per month for 12,000 shipments |
Contract Length | 1 month |
Peripheral Integrations | Supports thermal printers, inkjet/laser printers, barcode scanners, and USB scales |
Average Rating in User Reviews* | 4.78 out of 5 |
Customer Support | Via phone, email, live chat, or live screen sharing from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Pacific time seven days per week |
*Aggregate rating based on total scores from Capterra, Shopify App Store, BigCommerce App Store, and Webretailer.
OrderCup Alternatives
 |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|
Best for: Startups and SMBs | Best for: Companies scaling to meet shipping demands | Best for: High-volume sellers seeking a multipurpose tool | Best for: Managing all aspects of a warehouse or in-house fulfillment operation |
Price: Free to $159 per month | Price: $9.99–$159.99 per month | Price: Free to $999 per month | Price: $1,850–$1,995 per month |
We gave OrderCup high marks in this category thanks to its well-built free plan, competitive pricing, and helpful shipping discounts. But its narrow range of plan options may leave users paying for resources they don’t need, which brought its score down slightly.
The main differences between each OrderCup plan are the number of monthly shipments and user account allowance, but certain features are only available to mid- and high-level subscribers.
Plans | Pricing ($/Month) | Monthly Shipments | Users |
|---|---|---|---|
Free Trial | 30-Day | ||
Starter | Free | 50 | 1 |
Short | $25 | 500 | 1 |
Tall | $45 | 1,500 | 2 |
Grande | $65 | 3,000 | 3 |
Venti | $95 | 6,000 | 5 |
Trenta | $180 | 12,000 | 12 |
A 30-day free trial is available for all paid plans, and it provides users with unrestricted functionality. No credit card is required to sign up for a trial.
There’s no contract required to use OrderCup, and plans can be canceled, upgraded, or downgraded at any time. If you change your plan level mid-month, you will be credited or charged a prorated amount.
Subscribers on all plans, including the free plan, can use unlimited sales channels and other integrations.
Customer service is available via email, live chat, screen sharing, forum, and phone support for all paid plans. Free plan users are limited to email and forum support, but reviews for these lower-level services are still favorable.
Premium Support is offered as a $50/month add-on, and it’s a worthy investment for users managing complicated shipments―like cross-border exports―ecommerce beginners, and global sellers.
The add-on gives you unlimited toll-free phone support and priority handling for your service tickets. Premium support is included in the top-tier Trenta plan.
An Initial Setup and Consultation Package is available for $150, which buys complete setup and configuration of your OrderCup account from staff experts. The package includes an hour of consultation or training on software usage and shipping best practices.
OrderCup delivers sufficient functionality to power a simple operation. It earned points for this category for its peripheral connectivity, batch support, and unlimited channel allowance.
But unlike ShipStation and Easyship, it’s not cloud-based and doesn’t come with a mobile app, which could hinder complex operations. It also offers the least number of native integrations out of all the providers on our list, and its automation capabilities have room for improvement. Overall, it earned a score of 3.04 out of 5.
The following are the factors we considered when evaluating OrderCup’s functionality.
Customer Support
OrderCup’s quality of customer support is one of the biggest reasons we recommend it to small businesses.
Competing providers (namely ShipStation) offer a feature-packed platform for prices that aren’t much steeper than those of OrderCup. However, according to a wealth of reviews, its customer support is so inaccessible and ineffective that technical issues make the software more trouble than it’s worth.
Furthermore, many popular shipping solutions greatly restrict their support contact methods for low-level subscribers. For example, users on ShippingEasy’s Starter plan can only get help from a human through the company’s community forum. After posting a query, sellers must wait for support staff members to respond on their own time, which sometimes takes days.
OrderCup’s customer service team is available to all paid plans by phone, live chat, email, screen sharing, and a community forum. An integrated Web Support Portal allows you to create support tickets and keeps a history of all previous tickets.
The platform’s free plan doesn’t include access to phone support or live chat, but OrderCup’s email responsiveness is highly rated.
Help is available from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Pacific time, seven days a week. Plus, the team monitors for emergencies 24 hours a day.
A separate Europe-based support center is open 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Greenwich Mean time (GMT), seven days a week.
Peripheral Hardware
OrderCup supports web-based direct printing of labels, customs forms, and packing slips, plus zero-configuration scale and scanner support on PCs and Macs.
The platform works with the following devices:
- Most laser/inkjet printers
- Thermal printers that support EPL2 or ZPLII or Image formats, including most Zebra printers, Dymo, Brother, and other compatible thermal printers
- Most USB scales
- Most handheld USB scanners
Online Resources
OrderCup’s online knowledge base consists of a video library, blog, and community forum.
The company’s YouTube channel currently hosts 15 videos, each guiding the viewer through a step of the shipping process, such as setting up a USPS customs form and configuring OrderCup integrations.
The blog revolves more around announcements and events than actual learning resources, although it features some helpful posts for ecommerce sellers, such as “4 Ways to Communicate Your Shipping Details.”
The online resources available through OrderCup aren’t as built out as those of its competitors. ShippingEasy, for example, has a tutorial and guide library with more than 1,500 articles, plus checklists, guides, webinars, case studies, and calculators.
Integrations
With OrderCup, you get plug-and-play integrations with 36 major shopping carts, platforms, carriers, and marketplaces and ecommerce tools.
The software’s integration capabilities are fairly limited as compared to other shipping solutions. For reference, ShippingEasy offers 65 prebuilt connections with apps and tools and carriers, and ShipStation has 341. Currently, no API is available through OrderCup to build custom integrations.
This is one of the main reasons we recommend OrderCup as an entry-level solution for small-scale sellers. It’s a great tool for the price but may not be compatible with developed stores using a range of sales channels and ecommerce tools.
As a workaround, the platform can support data from incompatible apps by importing comma-separated values (CSV) files.
Here’s a complete list of OrderCup’s current direct integrations:
- Ecommerce platforms and shopping carts: 3dcart, BigCommerce, Lightspeed, Magento, PayPal, PrestaShop, Shopify, Spree Commerce, Volusion, and WooCommerce
- Marketplaces: Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Walmart, Walmart Canada, and Yahoo Stores
- Other tools: Chargebee, GroovePacker, and InsureShip
Compatible Carriers
OrderCup can ship with the following carriers:
- UPS
- UPS International
- USPS
- FedEx
- FedEx International
- DHL
- DX
- Amazon Seller Fulfilled Prime
- Canada Post
- Endicia
- Express 1
- First Mile
- InXpress
- Purolator
- Pitney Bowes
- Rakuten
- Sendle
- UK Mail
OrderCup’s core features include order management, providing basic features, such as batch processing, CSV entry, manual entry and editing, returns management, reporting and analytics, and more.
It also comes with inventory management capabilities, allowing you to manage your stock through OrderCup’s product catalog support with warehouse assignment options and automatic syncing with multiple channels.
Email marketing features, such as the ability to send and automate branded outgoing emails, packing slips, and tracking notifications are also available, but some functionality is limited on the free and Short plans.
We found that these core features perform moderately well on OrderCup’s platform, but competitors like Ordoro and ShippingEasy handled them better. OrderCup scored points in this category for its international shipping support and data import options but was docked for its weak reporting capabilities and lack of dropshipping functions.
The following are some of OrderCup’s standout features:
Rate Comparison Tool
All of our top shipping software picks feature a rate-shopping calculator tool that shows you the cost to ship your package with various carriers and methods, allowing you to pick the best rate.
OrderCup’s rate comparison tool isn’t as robust as those of ShippingEasy or ShipStation. Its user interface is less sleek and organized more simplistically but still highly functional. It displays a range of options on one screen and doesn’t require you to readjust preferences before generating results from competing carriers.
An example of OrderCup’s rate-shopping feature in use (Source: OrderCup)
Shipping Discounts & Perks
Discounted postage is a great perk of using shipping software. OrderCup takes this benefit a step further by offering discounts on many international carriers as well as local and regional transporters.
Plus, all users receive free pickups, free shipping supplies, and free global address verification.
These shipping discounts are available for all OrderCup subscribers, including starter plan users:
- USPS Commercial Plus rates: Commercial Plus Pricing is a program offered by the USPS that provides deeply discounted postage rates normally reserved for high-volume shippers. These discounts are available through OrderCup regardless of your sales volume.
- USPS International discounts: OrderCup states it provides users with rates lower than Commercial Plus Pricing for international shipments.
- Priority Mail Cubic pricing: USPS Cubic pricing is a part of USPS’s Priority Mail program, and it’s usually only accessible by businesses shipping 50,000 packages or more each year. These rates are determined by package size and distance traveled (rather than package weight). OrderCup automatically detects when your packages qualify for discounted Priority Mail Cubic pricing.
- Discounted DHL rates
- Discounted UK Mail rates
- Discounted DX rates
Automation
Users on all plans can automate tasks within their shipping workflow to minimize human input, reducing fulfillment time and labor.
OrderCup’s platform makes it easy to create rules based on conditions that trigger actions, such as purchasing shipping insurance automatically on any order of more than $100.
The web app has sophisticated filters to easily create specific conditions. You can define criteria using any of the order attributes below:
- Order Status
- Order Weight
- Order Value
- Order ID
- Requested Ship Method
- Item Name
- Product Code (SKU)
- Items Count
- Total Item Quantity
- Gift options
- Amazon Prime designation
- Destination Type
- Address Line 1
- Address Line 2
- City
- Status
- Country
- Date
- User
- Define your own custom filter
These conditions can be set independently or in conjunction with one another. They trigger any of these actions:
- Set Shipping Service
- Bill Shipping to Third Party
- Insure Package
- Change Order Status
- Request Confirmation
- Set Ship-From
- Apply Request Ship Method
- Set Total Order Weight
- Set Package Dimensions
- Assign to User
- Stop Processing Rules for the Order
- Define your own custom action
Automated actions can be mapped to specific services, such as carrier and shipping method selection. There’s no limit to the number of automations you can add to your OrderCup accounts.
Value-added Support Services
Subscribers can choose add-ons to make shipping easier, smoother, and less labor-intensive. These features are helpful for ecommerce beginners, global merchants, or sellers managing complicated shipments:
- Premium Support: For $50 per month or $500 per year, users get unlimited toll-free phone support in addition to the standard customer service contact methods. Premium Support tickets also receive priority responses, which gets eyes on your query as quickly as possible.
- Initial Setup and Consultation Package: For $150, new accounts can be set up fully and configured to your specifications by OrderCup staff. The package includes an hour of consultation or training on software usage and shipping best practices.
Through user reviews, research, and hands-on experience with the software, we found that OrderCup is very easy to use. This is largely due to its customer service, which is the best in its class.
Other contributing factors, such as its knowledge base and company website, aren’t as developed as those of other shipping solutions. But we found that these drawbacks don’t greatly impact the software’s usability.
Here’s an overview of the factors that contribute to OrderCup’s ease of use:
- Customer service hours: Support is available in North America from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Pacific time seven days per week except on US public holidays. In Europe, it is available from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Greenwich Mean time (GMT) seven days per week except on UK public holidays.
- Customer service accessibility: All paid plans can access support via phone, email, and live chat. Free starter plan users are limited to an online community forum.
- User interface: OrderCup delivers a simple interface with a variety of customizable layout options. It features a responsive design that works well on a range of devices and collapsible panels on key pages to improve usability.
- User management options: Paid plan subscribers with multiple user accounts can customize user permissions, although options are not as granular as some competitors. Some permissions features are only available on the Tall plan or higher.
- Insurance: OrderCup provides the option for discounted shipping insurance on domestic and international parcels through InsureShip.
- Returns: The platform includes returns management features that support on-demand return labels sent via email as well as auto-return labels that are included in the shipment. OrderCup also supports POUR labels, which only trigger payment once they’re used.
OrderCup is a solid, entry-level solution for small-scale sellers, but it lacks the features that more complex operations may need. For this reason, we gave it an Expert Score of 3.75 out of 5.
Although many of its features are lacking, OrderCup comes at an affordable price and offers a well-built free plan. Although it isn’t much cheaper than competing options, its excellent customer support and beginner-friendly usability give OrderCup unique value for ecommerce newcomers.
It also earned points in this category for its high popularity among its users, which is a good indicator of overall performance.
OrderCup was docked here for its lackluster features and inability to scale with fast-growing businesses. If you’re seeking a more robust shipping solution that can tackle multiple functions efficiently, we recommend Ordoro. For a budget-friendly plan with better integrations than OrderCup, check out ShipStation.
What Users Say in OrderCup Reviews
Since it’s a smaller company, online ratings of OrderCup are scarce on traditional software review websites like Capterra and G2.
Ecommerce platform app stores have the most insight from OrderCup users, and reviews are overwhelmingly positive.
Many reviewers mention switching to the software from one of the “bigger” shipping solutions due to the lack of customer support and being pleasantly surprised by the stark difference in service. High-quality support is a common theme across nearly all OrderCup reviews, with many users stating that they receive fast, personalized responses to even the most challenging issues.
A handful of ratings describe the software as “straightforward” and “clunky,” but some reviewers explain that the interface is highly customizable.
Most of the negative OrderCup reviews were left between 2011 and 2014. These ratings describe problems with support contact methods, Chrome compatibility, Mac compatibility, and server issues, all of which have now been resolved. Some of these reviews also mention persistent issues with OrderCup’s batch feature.
More recent negative ratings stem from the software being too simplistic and lacking features found in competing shipping solutions:
- Shopify App Store: 4.8/5 from 300-plus reviews
- BigCommerce App Store: 4.78/5 from nearly 20 reviews
- Capterra: 4/5 from just a handful of reviews
| PROS | CONS |
|---|---|
| Easy to use | Features are overly simplistic |
| Responsive and helpful support | Clunky user interface (UI) |
| Smooth integrations | Glitchy batch shipping features |
| Saves money | |
Methodology: How We Evaluated OrderCup
To evaluate OrderCup and other shipping software, we used a 28-point assessment that measures how well it meets small business shipping needs. We researched the provider through third-party reviews, user ratings, relevant articles, and the company’s own content. Then, we personally assessed OrderCup’s platform.
We look for high-performing functions, an intuitive interface, effective customer support, and additional features that go beyond the scope of shipping.
To find the best tool for small businesses, we prioritized economical pricing and factors that contribute to overall ease of use. Our ecommerce experts also weighed in with their assessments of each provider.
Click through the tabs below for our full evaluation criteria:
20%
Pricing
20%
Functionality
20%
Features
20%
Ease of Use
20%
Expert Score
20% of Overall Score
This criterion considers whether each provider offers a free starter plan and assesses the range of paid options available.
The contenders were graded on how competitively priced their plans are. We considered the features and benefits available at each pricing tier and docked points for limits on the functionality of lower-level options.
We only featured recommendations that support your own negotiated rates with UPS, FedEx, and DHL, and offer heavily discounted USPS Commercial Plus rates. The top-ranking providers on our list give users multicarrier discounts.
OrderCup scored highly here thanks to its well-built free plan, competitive pricing, and carrier discounts. However, it did lose points for its narrow range of plan options, bringing its total score down to 4.75 out of 5 for the category.
20% of Overall Score
We looked at the availability of key functions that maximize efficiency and accessibility for businesses of all sizes. This includes features like batch capabilities, label printing, CSV entry, and peripheral hardware compatibility.
Providers were also evaluated on the number of prebuilt integrations offered, access to an open API, sales channel allowance, and automation capabilities.
We gave OrderCup points for its powerful software that tackles all the core functions small businesses need as well as its unlimited sales channel allowance. The provider was docked for its lack of a mobile app and inability to display live rates at checkout, ultimately scoring 3.04 out of 5.
20% of Overall Score
This score considered the standard features of each shipping solution, including reporting/analytics, returns management, outbound email notifications, and user management options, and assessed how well they work. Shipping software with robust, well-developed features was awarded the most points.
The best shipping tools are multitaskers that save you time and money by handling functions outside of shipping management, so we also evaluated each provider on their dropshipping, order management, inventory management, and marketing features.
Many of OrderCup’s features aren’t as robust as some competitors, which cost it points in this category. It also isn’t very compatible with dropshipping. We awarded points for its excellent international shipping support and email features, giving it a final score of 3.93 out of 5.
20% of Overall Score
We evaluated each company for its user interface by considering how intuitively it works, reported uptime, site speed, and the learning curve to start.
This factor also looked at the number of learning resources available from each company, including webinars, demo videos, blogs, frequently asked questions (FAQs), case studies, libraries, guides, calculator tools, and forum activity.
Lastly, customer service accessibility was weighted heavily to provide the best recommendation. We considered hours of availability, contact methods, location of support staff, and quality of service.
OrderCup’s excellent customer service helped bolster its score in this section, along with its user-friendly interface. It was docked for having fewer online resources and user management options than its competitors. We gave it a final score of 4 out of 5.
20% of Overall Score
This score combined our ecommerce experts’ final evaluations of value, ease of use, and stand-out features with scores from real-world users. We combed through thousands of reviews to identify consistent pain points and high-performing features of each tool.
We gave OrderCup 3.75 out of 5 in this category, awarding points for its vast popularity among its users and its exceptionally high ease of use. But it has a number of lackluster functions that come at a cost not much cheaper than other options, so we deducted points for features and value.
*Percentages of overall score
Bottom Line
OrderCup is a solid shipping management tool that can save small businesses and startups a significant amount of time and money, but it may be too rudimentary for complex operations.
The software is an excellent pick for ecommerce newcomers, businesses on a budget, global retailers, and international shippers. But due to its lack of direct integrations and other features, it’s a poor choice for rapidly growing businesses.
If you manage fewer than 50 shipments per month, OrderCup’s free plan is a necessity. As you scale, other solutions may be a better fit, but OrderCup offers a 30-day free trial on any of its paid plans, so you can test it at any stage risk-free.
