Printers and packing stations
Picqer automatically prints shipping labels and, if you set that up, packinglists. You print product and location labels directly from Picqer, with the push of a button.
Below, you'll find which hardware you need, how to connect it, and what to do when a printer does print, but not correctly.
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What are printers and packing stations?
To print from Picqer, you connect your printers through PrintNode: a program you install on a Windows or Mac computer, which passes on the printers connected to that computer to Picqer. Every printer you add this way becomes selectable in Picqer.
A packing station is a workstation in your warehouse, for example a packing table. For each packing station you select which printer is used for packinglists, shipping labels, shipping documents, and product or location labels. As a user, you indicate which packing station you're working at, so documents always print on the right printer.
Why work with packing stations?
Without packing stations, you'd have to pick a printer manually for every print job. With packing stations, you set this up once per workstation: everyone working at that packing station automatically prints on the right printer, even when you run several packing tables at once.
How do you set up printers and packing stations?
1. Buy the right hardware
Which computer, scanner and printers you need per packing table is covered in packing table hardware. For shipping labels we recommend a Zebra label printer, for picklists and packinglists an A4 printer.
2. Connect the printer and install PrintNode
Install PrintNode on the computer connected to your printers, and connect your printers. Using a Zebra printer? Follow the steps to install a Zebra printer. This also covers the right paper and print quality settings.
3. Add your printer and packing station in Picqer
Go to Settings > Printers and follow the steps to connect your PrintNode account, add your first printer, and create a packing station. You need at least one printer before you can create a packing station.
4. Fix a printing problem
Nothing coming out of the printer, or labels printing blank, double, skewed or in poor quality? Work through troubleshooting printer issues.
What do you need in Picqer?
To print from Picqer, you use these parts of Picqer:
- PrintNode: connects the printers on your computer to Picqer.
- Printers: every physical printer you want to use in Picqer, added here with a name and paper size.
- Packing stations: the workstations in your warehouse, each with their own printer per document type.
Useful additions:
- Rules: to use a different printer than the default in specific cases, for example a different shipping label size for a particular shipping provider.
What does Picqer handle automatically?
Once your printers and packing stations are set up, Picqer automatically handles this:
- Picklists are printed as soon as they're created, for example after closing an order or processing a backorder.
- Packinglists are printed on the selected packing station as soon as you close a picklist, if a printer for packinglists is set up there.
- Shipping labels are printed as soon as a shipment is created.
Don't want one of these documents to print automatically? Choose "Do not print automatically" at Settings > Printers.
