# Buy and render a shipping label

**POST** `/v1/labels`

Base URL: `https://api.parcel-events.example`

Tags: `Labels`

## Authorization

Any ONE of the following options authorizes this operation; every scheme listed within an option is required together.

| Option | Scheme | Type | Sent as | Scopes |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Option 1 | `ApiKey` | `apiKey` | header `Parcel-API-Key` | — |
| Option 2 | `BearerToken` | `http` | `Authorization: Bearer <token>` (opaque) | — |

## Header parameters

| Name | Type | Required | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `Idempotency-Key` | `string` (uuid) | Yes | — |

## Request body

Required. Media type: `application/json`

### Example request body

```json
{
  "format": "pdf",
  "page_size": "four_by_six",
  "shipment_id": "shp_00000000000000000001"
}
```

## Responses

| Status | Description | Media type |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `201` | Label created | `application/json` |
| `402` | The synthetic account cannot purchase this label | `application/problem+json` |
| `422` | One or more fields failed semantic validation | `application/problem+json` |

### Example response: 201 — Label created

```json
{
  "download_url": "https://downloads.parcel-events.example/labels/synthetic-label.pdf",
  "expires_at": "2026-06-09T00:00:00Z",
  "format": "pdf",
  "id": "lbl_00000000000000000001",
  "object": "label",
  "price": {
    "amount": "12.50",
    "currency": "XTS"
  },
  "shipment_id": "shp_00000000000000000001"
}
```

### Example response: 402 — The synthetic account cannot purchase this label

```json
{
  "request_id": "req_00000000000000000003",
  "status": 402,
  "title": "Synthetic balance is insufficient",
  "type": "https://parcel-events.example/problems/payment-required"
}
```

### Example response: 422 — One or more fields failed semantic validation

```json
{
  "errors": [
    {
      "message": "must be a synthetic postal code",
      "path": "recipient.postal_code"
    }
  ],
  "request_id": "req_00000000000000000006",
  "status": 422,
  "title": "Synthetic request validation failed",
  "type": "https://parcel-events.example/problems/validation"
}
```

## Related pages

- [Cancel a pickup](./cancelpickup.md)
- [Cancel a shipment before handoff](./cancelshipment.md)
- [Create a shipment](./createshipment.md)
- [Delete a webhook endpoint](./deletewebhookendpoint.md)
- [Labels](./tags/labels.md)
- [List scheduled pickups](./listpickups.md)
- [List shipments](./listshipments.md)
- [List tracking events for a shipment](./listshipmentevents.md)
- [List webhook endpoints](./listwebhookendpoints.md)
- [Parcel Events Sandbox API](../../api.md)

# Agent Instructions

This portal answers questions programmatically. To receive a synthesized,
source-cited answer instead of crawling page by page, append the `?ask=`
query parameter to any page URL on this site:

    /guides/quickstart?ask=how+do+I+authenticate

Optional parameters:

- `&goal=<what-you-are-trying-to-do>` steers the answer toward your
  objective (e.g. `&goal=write+a+python+client`).
- `&version=<label>` scopes the answer to a mounted version when the
  portal publishes more than one.

The response is `text/markdown`: the answer followed by a `# Sources` list
of the portal pages it was grounded in. Status codes are the contract:

- `200` — the answer; `402` — the portal owner’s plan or answer credits are
  exhausted (surface this to your operator; do NOT retry); `429` — you are
  rate-limited; back off for the `Retry-After` seconds; `503` — the answer
  lane is temporarily unavailable; fall back to crawling the `.md` pages.

For the full corpus map read `llms.txt` at the site root; for the tool
surface (search + page fetch as MCP tools) see `/mcp`.