Free Money: “It’s in the Mail”!

March 7, 2013 By Leave a Comment

USPS investing in it’s customer’s business.

The Postal Service is giving away $5,000 to every customer!*  No joke!

In fact, this may be the most un-USPS-like business move I’ve seen the Postal Service make in the 36 years I’ve been involved with them.  They are actually offering to give “tech credits” of up to $5,000 to customers who move to Full Service Intelligent Mail before the January 2014 deadline.   Customers who do not move to Full Service IMb by January 2014 will not be eligible to receive postal automation workshare discounts.

You may be asking, “What’s Full Service IMb”?

Good question!

Full Service IMb is a major change in how mailers prepare mail, pay postage, and obtain information about the mail once it’s placed in the mailstream.  It will allow mailers to track every piece of mail from acceptance to delivery at no cost.  Imagine – tracking information for a mail piece that costs 36 cents for postage!  This kind of information is possible because Full Service IMb requires a unique serial number to be placed within each barcode on each mailpiece.  It also requires electronic documentation and payment.  With Full Service IMb, the USPS will know how much mail is going to show up today and where it is going to go!  Businesses that use reply envelopes will even know how much money will show up in their mailbox tomorrow and the days to follow.

By offering the Full Service Technology Credit, USPS is acknowledging that meeting the Jan 2014 Full Service IMb requirement will take an investment on the part of the customer to upgrade both software and mailroom equipment.  This requires a partnership with software and mail service providers to meet the criteria allowing electronic documentation to/from the mailroom and the USPS.  No more hard copy postage statements.

Why not let the USPS give you a $5,000 credit against your postage?  Especially considering you’ll have to upgrade to Full Service IMb by January to get a presort discount anyway?

I say “hats off” to the USPS for helping their customers make this happen.  It’s what the USPS needs to do to help their customers stay “in the mail”.

*Here’s the “rest of the story”:  In order to qualify for the Tech Credit, you must meet an annual mail volume of 125,000 pieces.   If you are interested in some extra cash in your business’ postage budget, check this out:

https://ribbs.usps.gov/intelligentmail_latestnews/documents/tech_guides/TechCreditOverview.pdf

Filed Under: IMB, Intelligent Mail, Post Office, Postage Rates, Uncategorized, USPS Tagged With: , , , , , ,

A penny for your thoughts

October 19, 2012 By Leave a Comment

I guess they do add up.

I’ve been thinking about pennies a lot lately.  I can actually remember when penny candy at the 5 and Dime cost a penny.  Not a pretty penny.  Just a penny.  One Cent.  What’s a penny worth today, anyway (besides the obvious answer: “a penny”)?  At the convenience store, I try not to put those pennies in my pocket (they’re a nuisance).  They go in the “need one take one” bowl sitting by the cash register (and yet I can’t ever remember taking one…I hope someone does).  They collect in my car’s cup holder until they turn everything green.  Any change that’s in my pocket at the end of the day goes in the change jar on my dresser, including the pennies which always makes for a somewhat disappointing experience when we take them to the bank before vacation.  If I see one on the ground, I don’t pick it up.   They often get sucked up in the vacuum cleaner and make a lot of noise in the process.

So why am I thinking about pennies?  The price of a First Class stamp will go up by that much in January.  A penny.  For some reason, when it’s an increase in postage a penny all of a sudden is A LOT OF MONEY!  I remember each postage rate increase in my 33 years with the Postal Service. There were 15 of them.  Each time, it was big news with lots of complaints and long lines at the window with people buying one cent stamps for a penny.  Mmmm, I guess there is something you can buy with a penny!  (I still believe the Forever Stamp was one of the smartest things the USPS has ever done!)

The USPS delivers approximately 171 billion pieces of mail each year.  That penny increase will total $1.7 billion, which is a lot of money but doesn’t really put a dent in the $10 billion in payments to Congress that the USPS has defaulted on in the past two months.  Many people will feel that the USPS is gouging the public with the penny increase.  Just as many will say “why don’t you just make it a nickel and quit changing the rates all the time?”.  That would take an act of Congress considering the 2006 Postal Accountability & Enhancement Act says USPS can not raise rates more than the Consumer Price Index. That one penny is a 2.2% increase.

Since we’re talking postage and pennies, did you know those cute Postal vehicles that are used to deliver the mail 6 days a week put on 1.25 billion miles each year to deliver that mail?  They burn 399 million gallons of gasoline to make their rounds.  And I know you are fully aware that a gallon of gasoline went up 76 pennies since the last rate increase.  Maybe the USPS should have simply called it a “fuel surcharge” rather than a rate increase?

After thinking about pennies for the past few days, I’ve come to the conclusion that pennies do indeed add up.  If you’re concerned about the increase for your personal use: buy Forever Stamps. If you’re concerned about the increase for your business, let’s talk about Full Service Intelligent Mail!

A penny for your thoughts? Feel free to add your “2 cents” worth…

Filed Under: IMB, Intelligent Mail, Post Office, Postage Rates, Uncategorized, USPS Tagged With: , , , ,

Are you ticklish?

September 26, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Most of the news you hear about the USPS these days is pretty negative.  There’s a lot of dooms-day reporting out there.  So lets review some positives about the USPS.

The Postal Service is now providing educational webinars for mailers as we all begin to face the January 2013 deadline to retire the POSTNET barcode.   A series of three on-line webinars were given several times this summer.  They were recorded and are available for viewing at your leisure.  For a description of the webinars as well as links to the recordings and presentations, click here to go to the Education page.

There is a wealth of information available on their National Customer Support Center portal (known as “RIBBS” to all long-time veterans of the Mailing Industry).  I took the time to sit in on the webinars and I came away with mixed emotions.  I highly recommend them to anyone getting ready to transition to Intelligent Mail.  At the same time, I would expect anyone to come away with more questions than they started with.  Transitioning to Full Service Intelligent Mail is extremely technical with requirements for electronic documentation, unique serial numbers on each mail piece and data feedback reports.  The “on ramp” to Full Service IMB is a steep one.

Enter RIBBS to the rescue!  From high level overviews to in-depth technical guides, all of the resource files necessary to successfully ramp-up are available on this website.  Hats off to the USPS for putting everything within easy grasp.

After reviewing resources available, it is clear that both the mailer and the USPS will be counting on vendors to become the subject matter experts.  January 2014 is the deadline for all mailers to be ready with Full Service Intelligent Mail in order to qualify for postal automation discounts.  If we want to be invited to the workshare party, we need to start tickling some RIBBS!

Do you have questions about implementing Intelligent Mail?  Tickle me by commenting on this post.

Filed Under: IMB, Intelligent Mail, Uncategorized, USPS Tagged With: , , , ,