Facebook Marketplace UK: How to Ship When There Are No Labels

In the United States, Marketplace has a checkout: the buyer pays through Facebook, the seller gets a prepaid label and Meta releases the money after delivery. That feature has never been available in the UK. Facebook's own help pages describe checkout with shipping as unavailable outside the US, and the UK guides that claim an 'Evri integration' or a '5% seller fee' are recycling the American rules. Even in the US, Meta stopped creating prepaid labels for new listings on 24 February 2025.

So for a UK seller a Marketplace listing has two options: 'local pickup', where the buyer collects and pays in person, or a listing where you state you are willing to post. In the second case, everything — payment, postage, tracking, what happens if the parcel goes missing — is arranged between you and the buyer in Messenger. Facebook holds no money, issues no label, mediates no dispute and offers no compensation.

That is not a reason to avoid posting; plenty of small items sell better nationally than locally. It is a reason to run the transaction like a private sale: get paid through a method with protection, use a tracked service, and keep records.

PayPal Goods & Services is the standard choice. The buyer pays the item price plus postage, PayPal takes a fee from you (around 3% plus a fixed amount), and both sides get PayPal's protection: the buyer can claim if the item never arrives, and you keep seller protection as long as you post to the address on the PayPal payment and can show tracking. Never accept PayPal Friends & Family — it strips out all protection and is the classic scam request — and be wary of bank transfers from strangers, which give the buyer no way to recover money and give you no evidence of who paid.

Wait until the payment shows as completed in your PayPal account before you post; a screenshot of a 'payment sent' screen is not evidence. Post only to the address PayPal shows, not an address the buyer sends afterwards. If a buyer wants you to use a courier they have 'already booked', or sends a link to a courier site asking you to pay a release or insurance fee, it is a scam every time.

• PayPal Goods & Services, never Friends & Family
• Post only after the payment is completed, and only to the PayPal address
• No bank transfers from strangers, no 'courier links', no fees to release money
• Keep the Messenger conversation until well after delivery

You are buying your own postage, so the same logic applies as for Depop's 'Other' option or your own eBay-outside-Simple-Delivery sales. For clothing, shoes and anything that fits a locker compartment (41 × 38 × 64 cm, under 15 kg), InPost is cheapest: £1.99 for a Small compartment, £2.59 Medium or £3.99 Large to another locker or InPost Shop, or £2.89 to £5.99 to the buyer's door. Book in the InPost app, drop off with the QR code and no printer, and note that InPost refuses anything with a battery, liquids and aerosols, and covers second-hand items only up to £50.

For bulkier items up to 15 kg and 120 cm — furniture parts, boxed goods, bundles — Evri costs £2.62 to a ParcelShop or £3.04 to a home address for under 1 kg and £6.59 for 2–5 kg, includes £20 of cover and can be booked with a QR code for a ParcelShop or an Evri locker. For anything valuable, Royal Mail Tracked 48 (£3.65, £75 cover) or Special Delivery (from £9.45, £750 cover, signature) is the safe choice; Royal Mail also goes to 20 kg, which the others do not.

Whatever you choose, it must be tracked. Tracking is the only thing that settles a PayPal dispute in your favour, and it is what tells you the parcel actually arrived before the 180-day claim window closes.

State in the listing that you can post, what it costs and which courier, so the buyer is not surprised: 'Can post for £3.50 tracked, PayPal Goods & Services only' is enough. Weigh the packed item on kitchen scales and measure it before quoting — a 1.1 kg parcel is not a 1 kg parcel — and add a little for the mailing bag. Marketplace buyers expect to negotiate on the item price, not the postage, so quote postage at cost.

Photograph the item before packing and again in the bag with the label on. If a buyer later claims it arrived damaged or was not as described, those photos plus the tracking are your evidence with PayPal. Send a message with the tracking number as soon as you have dropped it off; it reduces 'where is it' messages and shows good faith if anything goes wrong.

Because Marketplace has no built-in payment, scammers use it constantly. The common patterns: a buyer 'pays' with a fake PayPal or bank email; a buyer overpays and asks you to refund the difference before the original payment bounces; a buyer wants to send 'their courier' and asks you to pay a fee via a link; a buyer asks for a code sent to your phone to 'verify you are real' (it is a two-factor code for your own account); or a buyer moves the conversation to WhatsApp and pushes for Friends & Family. Genuine buyers pay through PayPal Goods & Services, wait for you to post and do not send links.

For high-value items — phones, consoles, designer goods — many sellers refuse to post at all and insist on collection with cash or bank transfer in person. If you do post, use Royal Mail Special Delivery for the signature and cover, and never send to an address other than the one on the PayPal payment.

Marketplace is not the only place you post at your own risk. Grailed does not issue labels to UK sellers, so you buy Royal Mail or Evri postage and must upload tracking within 7 days. Shpock's Secure Delivery lets you use your own courier or a Parcel2Go label and asks you to upload proof of posting within 10 days. Preloved has an optional Trustap escrow where you post with your own postage and enter tracking. The advice is the same in each case: tracked postage, a payment method with protection, and records of everything.

If you sell the same kinds of item regularly, the platforms with built-in labels — Vinted, Depop, eBay's Simple Delivery and now Gumtree's Delivery on Gumtree — remove most of this risk, because the postage is prepaid, the tracking is automatic and the money is held until delivery.