UCC Label Templates: Creating and Previewing UCC Shipping Labels

Keep each retailer’s SSCC pallet and carton label layouts as ZPL templates in one library: name them by the convention, edit with a live preview, test with sample data, and let printing auto-match the right template by retailer and label kind.

Retailers do not accept “close enough” shipping labels: each one wants its SSCC pallet and carton labels laid out its own way. Docklify keeps those layouts as templates in WMS → Settings → Print Templates (/wms/templates). A template is a piece of ZPL (the label printer’s language) with placeholders like [[SSCC]] where the real values go; at print time Docklify fills the placeholders from the order and picks the template automatically. The same library also holds Packing List templates — use the tabs at the top of the page to switch between UCC labels and Packing lists.

The naming and auto-match convention (read this first)#

• Name format: retailer-size-kind-Vn — for example walmart-4x6-pallet-V1; a packing list looks like default-8.5x11-V1. Names are lowercase letters, digits and dashes, and globally unique.
• Auto-match at print time: Docklify looks up active UCC templates by retailer + label kind (Pallet / Carton); when several match, the highest version wins. Orders without a retailer (B2C) skip UCC labels entirely.
• Placeholders such as [[SSCC]] are replaced with real values at print time. Editing a template’s ZPL and saving bumps its version by 1 automatically.
• Amazon FBA has no UCC requirement — it uses its own label system — so do not create UCC templates for it. Amazon Vendor/DC does require them. If you pick a retailer with no UCC requirement in the form, the page warns you on the spot.

Step 1: Create a template#

1. Open WMS → UCC Label Templates and click “New template”.
2. Choose the Template kind: UCC or Packing List.
3. Pick the Retailer the template belongs to, set the Size (for example 4x6) and — for UCC templates — the Label kind: Pallet or Carton. The label kind is required for UCC.
4. Let the Template name fill itself in: while you choose retailer, size and kind, the form builds the conventional name (retailer-size-kind-V1) for you. You can still type over it before saving — just keep the format.
5. Write or paste the ZPL source in the editor, using placeholders (see the list below) wherever a value changes per label. Leave “Active” checked so printing can match the template, then click Save.

While you type, the live preview under the editor renders the label with sample values filled in — you see the layout change as you edit, without printing a single test label. That page (ZPL editor plus live preview) is the fastest way to nudge a field into place on WMS → UCC Label Templates.

Placeholders you can use in the ZPL#

• [[SSCC]] — the SSCC-18 code, with the GS1 check digit included.
• Order and destination: [[ORDER_NO]] outbound order number, [[PO_NO]] retailer PO number, [[RETAILER]] retailer name, [[CARRIER]] carrier, [[SHIP_DATE]] ship date.
• Ship-to address: [[SHIP_TO_NAME]], [[SHIP_TO_ADDRESS]], [[SHIP_TO_CITY]], [[SHIP_TO_STATE]], [[SHIP_TO_ZIP]].
• Contents and sequence: [[ITEM_SKU]], [[ITEM_NAME]], [[QTY]], plus [[CARTON_SEQ]] for the carton number and [[PALLET_SEQ]] for the pallet number.

Step 2: Preview with sample data before anyone prints#

1. In the template list, click the template to open its own page, then scroll to the “Sample data preview” section.
2. The preview panel lists one input per placeholder found in the ZPL, pre-filled with sensible sample values (including a valid sample SSCC). Adjust any value you want to test.
3. Click “Render preview”. You get the rendered label image at the template’s size, the list of any placeholders that stayed unreplaced, and — under “Replaced ZPL” — the exact ZPL after substitution, so you can check precisely what the printer would receive.

If the unreplaced list is not empty, a placeholder in your ZPL has no value to fill it — fix the name (placeholders are matched exactly, double brackets included) or make sure the printing flow supplies that field, before the template goes active for real orders.

Step 3: Manage the library — clone, deactivate, reactivate#

• Clone (from the template’s page): opens the new-template page with the whole template copied in (the name gets a “-copy” suffix and the version restarts at 1). Clone when a retailer wants a variant — keep the working original untouched.
• Built-in templates are read-only: they can be previewed and cloned, but not edited or deactivated. To customize one, clone it and edit the copy.
• Deactivate (on the template’s page) stops a template from being matched at print time without deleting it; Reactivate brings it back. Tick “Show inactive” and use the retailer / label-kind filters and the name search to keep a growing library manageable.
• The list shows each template’s name, retailer, kind, size, version, status and last updated time — sort your housekeeping by version: within one retailer + kind group, only the highest active version is used at print time.
• Version history: every save records a snapshot on the template’s page — open “Version history” to view any past version exactly as it was, or clone a past version into a new template when a change needs to be rolled back.

See which template each retailer will actually use#

You do not have to guess from the library which template a retailer ends up with. Open WMS → Retailers: the list shows two status columns (UCC templates / Packing list template) marking each retailer as Dedicated, Default (standard), None or Not required. Open a retailer’s edit page and the “Linked templates” section shows the three slots — UCC Pallet, UCC Carton and Packing List — each rendered with the same sample data, so you see the actual label that would print. Docklify also surfaces the linked templates right there while you maintain the retailer record.

• A slot marked “Default (standard template)” means the retailer has no dedicated template and printing falls back to the shared standard one; from the same card you can create a dedicated template or clone the standard one as dedicated.
• If a slot says “No template available”, what happens depends on the slot: a Packing List cannot print until a template exists, while UCC labels fall back to the system’s built-in layout — either way, the card links straight to creating one. Retailers with no UCC requirement (like Amazon FBA) show “No UCC requirement” instead of a preview.
• The retailer pages only display and link — changing a template’s contents or which retailer it belongs to always happens on the template’s own page, so there is exactly one place to make changes.

Docklify features used in this article#

• WMS → UCC Label Templates (/wms/templates): template library with UCC / Packing List tabs, retailer and label-kind filters, name search and show-inactive toggle
• ZPL editor with live preview: edit the source and watch the label render with sample values as you type
• Preview with sample data: render a template, list unreplaced placeholders and inspect the replaced ZPL before printing
• Print-time auto-match: active UCC templates matched by retailer + label kind, highest version wins
• Clone / deactivate / reactivate: variant handling and lifecycle management without deleting templates
• Retailer linked templates: status columns on the Retailers list and preview cards on each retailer’s edit page, all deep-linking to the template’s own page
• Version history: a snapshot of every save, viewable and cloneable from the template page