Postal Affairs Blog

The following was published in the DMM Advisory today:

September DMM Update

Postal Explorer® (pe.usps.com) is your source for up-to-date mailing standards. The Domestic Mail Manual is fully searchable on Postal Explorer and features fly-out menus, cross-reference links, and an extensive subject index. Today we updated our mailing standards to capture the following changes:

Alternative Addressing Format Options
We revised 507.1.0 and 602.3.0 to permit the use of certificates of mailing, Confirm service, Delivery Confirmation, and special handling extra services when using an alternative address format.

Contents of Periodicals Mail
We revised 707.3.0 to incorporate “content” changes to the standards governing pages, supplements, products and product samples, and mailpiece design.

New Endorsement for Returned Mailpieces
We revised Exhibit 507.1.4.1 to add a new endorsement, “Returned to Sender, Item Contains Nonmailable Contents,” for mailpieces that are returned due to contents that are nonmailable.

Commercial Flats Clarification
We revised 301.1.0 to update commercial flats text with minor editorial updates, and to rearrange the DMM reference text for better flow.

Clarification of Standards for Parcel Select
We revised 453.3.0 to remove standards for loyalty and growth rebates. We also revised 602.1.5.3 to note that all Parcel Select pieces must have a return address.

Delivery Address Visibility in Window Envelopes
We revised 202.2.1 and 302.2.1 to add a reference to current standards that require the delivery address to be completely visible within a window envelope, when used.

New Font Size Option for Optional Endorsement Lines
We revised 708.7.2 to provide a new font size option for mailers applying an optional endorsement line (OEL) to their mailpieces that do not bear a traditional Address Change Service (ACS) participant code.

Confirmation Services to the Northern Mariana Islands—ZIP Code 96952
We revised 503.9.2.4 and 503.10.2.3 to eliminate the Northern Mariana Islands (ZIP Code 96952) from the tables of ineligible ZIP Codes to receive Delivery Confirmation and Signature Confirmation services.

Our next scheduled DMM update is October 4.

Today’s DMM Advisory issued the following update:

IMb™ Services Update

FAST^® Release 15.0.0 will deploy on November 7, 2010. Updated FAST 15.0.0 Release Notes are available at http://ribbs.usps.gov/fast/documents/tech_guides/FASTRelease/. The key features of this release are:

• Users now have the capability to choose to receive emails for stand-alone content association.
• The FAST Web Services messaging will be updated to account for previous error messages.

The Domestic Mail Manual (DMM) is available on Postal Explorer (pe.usps.com). To subscribe to the DMM Advisory, send an e-mail to dmmadvisory@usps.com. Simply indicate “subscribe” in the subject line.

With the recent publication of our latest white paper - ”Intelligent Mail Full-Service:  Critical Steps to Understanding and Implementing” – we want to hear from you. 

Take this opportunity to comment, question, disagree – whatever you want – but do it here.  Reply to this blog post.  Let us know how we did. 

Wallace Vingelis

Director, Postal Industry Practice

Window Book, Inc.                

Phone:  (617) 395-4569

email:    wvingelis@windowbook.com

In our ongoing efforts to educate mailers and the postal industry as a whole about critical changes happening with the USPS, we are publishing an informative, 29-page white paper titled, “Intelligent Mail Full-Service: Critical Steps to Understanding and Implementing”.

The Postal Team here at Window Book believes that in this white paper you’ll discover:

• What’s going on in the Postal industry
• The differences between the Full-Service and Basic options
• What Full-Service will do for you (It’s not just about the discounts!)
• The 3 ways to participate in the USPS PostalOne! System  
• What steps you need to take, and in which order, to get going with IM Full-Service
• And much, much more!

Click here to download your free copy of Intelligent Mail Full-Service: Critical Steps to Understanding and Implementing.

Wallace Vingelis

Director, Postal Industry Practice

Window Book, Inc.                

Phone:  (617) 395-4569

email:    wvingelis@windowbook.com

There was a meeting of the MTAC 135 Workgroup today to discuss the feedback from USPS Engineering on the D&R (Dispatch & Routing) tags. (rewind a few weeks –> mailers had requested some additional white space be allocated on the D&R tags to allow them some room for “mailer information” – Engineering’s first response was “no – we don’t see a business reason for it” – the industry said “it’s not YOUR business need – it’s OURS” -> fast forward to now)  Engineering now says they can accommodate either a longer or wider tag, but the industry has to make a decision on which because it can’t support both.  When that decision is made by the industry, Engineering will work on and publish specs detailing where the mailer info white-space is.  (btw, rumor has it than an internal USPS mock-up document showed the mailer info at the bottom of the tag)

The USPS will first contact the tag and print vendors to see what they can support (longer or wider or either) – then they will survey the mailers.  More info to follow as it becomes available.

A meeting attendee asked if the USPS will change THEIR stock to accommodate the new sized tags (when in use) to fully cover the mailer’s tag if there is the need for an “overlay”.

The USPS responded that they will need to look into how to accomodate this – just as the industry will – and they will let us know.

Wallace Vingelis

Director, Postal Industry Practice

Window Book, Inc.                

Phone:  (617) 395-4569

email:    wvingelis@windowbook.com

At last week’s MTAC meetings, things were a little different than normal.  Instead of a lot of committee and workgroup updates on the first day (Wednesday), the USPS requested that the MTAC membership and attendees break out into separate workgroups to focus on USPS innovation for the future.  There were 10 separate groups all tasked with the same thing:  bringing innovative ideas to the attention of the USPS for consideration and implementation.  All 10 groups ranked their top 3 ideas and presented them to the rest of the MTAC attendees.  These 30ish (not every group had 3) ideas were captured and sent around for everyone to vote on with the goal being a Top 3 list for the USPS to act and report on. 

Unfortunately, the Top 3 list was not available before we broke the meetings on Thursday, but as soon as it’s available, I’ll post it here.  In the meantime, check out the list of top ideas we voted on:

Symposium Results – Page 1

Symposium Results – Page 2

Symposium Results – Page 3

Wallace Vingelis

Director, Postal Industry Practice

Window Book, Inc.                

Phone:  (617) 395-4569

email:    wvingelis@windowbook.com

If you need assistance with the USPS FAST system, you can submit your issue via email to FAST@usps.com.  Or, depending on the date, you can call one of the two numbers below:

• Prior to August 30, 2010 – call 1-800-522-9085
• After     August 30, 2010 – call 1-877-569-6614

** If you are having any problems with your Customer/Supplier Agreements (CSAs) – you must log these issues with the FAST Help Desk via one of the methods listed above. **

Wallace Vingelis

Director, Postal Industry Practice

Window Book, Inc.

Phone:  (617) 395-4569

email:    wvingelis@windowbook.com

This group was formed by the Mailers Technical Advisory Group (MTAC) to discuss and work through any FAST-related issues that were tabled and passed to it by MTAC 122 – as well as new issues that have come up since the announcement of this group forming.  The first meeting was held this past week on Wednesday afternoon.  If you are interested in joing this User Group, please contact the Industry Co-Chair Michelle Billman of ALG Worldwide Logistics at mbillman@algworldwide.com. 

Here are a few highlights from that initial meeting:

There is a “patch release” (14.3.0) coming out on August 15 (FAST is trying to follow the overall PostalOne! release schedule.)  Here is some helpful info from the latest DMM Advisory:

*** FAST Release 14.3.0 and Scheduled Outages (August 15-16, 2010): FAST^® Release 14.3.0 will deploy to the production environment on Sunday, August 15, 2010. Updated release notes for FAST 14.3.0 are available on RIBBS>Site Index A-Z>FAST/Surface Visibility>Important Links>FAST Release Notes. The FAST production system will not be available from 4 a.m. through 8 a.m. (CDT) on Sunday, August 15, 2010.

FAST Release 14.3.0 will deploy to the Test Environment for Mailers (TEM) on Monday, August 16, 2010. The FAST TEM system will not be available from 8 a.m. through 12 Noon (CDT) on Monday, August 16, 2010. ***

The pre-release notes available on RIBBS were updated to include information about the new Help Desk set up for FAST.  The industry seems a bit hesitant (I’m being nice here) about how helpful this will be.  They are concerned that if they have a truck full of mail at the dock that is not being accepted, they will more than likely still have to go through their current escalation routine to get the mail accepted as opposed to just calling the Help Desk for resolution.  The USPS says those calls will route to a Manager on Duty at that facility.  The problem there is that the normal escalation process inside the facility already includes contacting that manager, so that Help Desk routing could end up with a mailer saying “Hello Manager John – I need to complain about Manager John I was just talking to.”  (Could be a touchy situation!)

Last discussion item was about the open issues handed off from MTAC 122 and how to open new issues moving forward.  It was decided to table that until next meeting when Ed Wanta (USPS) would be on the call.

As we hurtle along towards 2011 and increased postage prices due to the USPS exigency filing, IDEAlliance formally published the Mail.dat 11-1 specification for the industry’s review.  This new specification is designed to take into account new items being requested by the industry and the USPS for better communications amongst ourselves and with the USPS via PostalOne!  Although, truth be told, it’s more the latter than the former.  With the publishing of the final spec, there are a few things/dates people need to know: 

1. All reviews must be complete and comments turned in by Friday, 08/06/10.  Due to the compressed schedule for publishing this spec requested by the USPS, there is only 1 week to dig into and review this new spec.
2. The “must-catch” date is 12/02/10 – This is the date software that receives and reads Mail.dat files (like Window Book’s DAT-MAIL or the USPS PostalOne! system) must be ready to receive (catch) files formatted using the 11-1 spec.
3. The “must-send” date is 02/02/11 – This is the date software that creates Mail.dat files must be able to produce files formatted using the 11-1 spec.
4. Expected date of exigency price increase is 01/02/11 – These 3 dates create a 60-day window between catch and send dates for Mail.dat with the price increase date right in the middle.
5. When reviewing the new spec, it’s easier to start at the back!  Find the section in the back that details the changes to the spec between 11.1.0.0 and 9.1.0.3 (page 154) and use that to guide you through your review. 
6. Pay attention to the new “air box” scenario described on page 150.  These are containers that mailers are being required to use even though the USPS doesn’t have many technical details about them.   

For those of you just getting familiar with Mail.dat (and Mail.XML), Window Book will be presenting a Mail.dat/Mail.XML Webinar on Tuesday, 08/10/10 at 3:00 pm EDT.  Interested parties can register at http://www.windowbook.com/WindowBookWebinars.aspx.

Wallace Vingelis

Director, Postal Industry Practice

Window Book, Inc.

Phone:  (617) 395-4569

Fax:        (617) 395-5969

email:    wvingelis@windowbook.com

URL:       www.windowbook.com

The major small package shipping companies have announced their new rates for 2010, which become effective on January 4, 2010. FedEx_® announced an average increase of 4.9 percent, as did UPS™. Both companies announced increases for ground shipping options of 4.9%, with higher increases for expedited and international shipments. The higher increases, around 6.9%, are being offset somewhat by lowering the fuel surcharges by 2%. It is important to note that along with the increase to their base rates, UPS and FedEx are also increasing their accessorial charges and surcharges. It is important for shippers to take these additional increases into account as well as the base price increases, as the accessorial charges can really add up.

 The United States Postal Service^® (USPS^®) announced increases on their shipping prices of 3.3% on average. The USPS price structure does not include accessorial charges such as residential delivery, Saturday delivery or fuel surcharges.

 USPS Price Percentage Changes by Category

For companies who ship packages in bulk quantities, there are reduced rate Commercial Base prices and Commercial Plus prices. Commercial Base pricing reflects a savings of 5% to 10% over retail prices, depending on the shipping category. Commercial Base pricing is available for qualifying Express Mail, Priority Mail, Global Express Guaranteed, Express Mail International and Priority Mail International shippers. There are varying qualifying criteria for each category of shipper, such as using Permit, PC Postage, Click-N-Ship, or an approved Information Based Indicia (IBI) metering device.

 Commercial Plus prices are available for large volume shippers who meet the criteria for Commercial Base pricing, and who ship more than 100,000 Priority Mail packages per year, or more than 6,000 Express Mail packages per year, or who have a customer commitment agreement with the Postal Service. The savings over Retail prices for this category range from 9.6% for Priority Mail to 14.5% for Express Mail.

 The USPS also made some other interesting changes in their rate structure for 2010:

• There are some rates that are actually going DOWN! The retail price for Priority Mail Flat Rate Envelopes went down from $4.95 to $4.90.  These Priority Mail flat rate envelopes are already a super deal, so this rate reduction makes them even more attractive. Like the TV commercials say, “If it fits, it ships.” For mailers shipping in bulk quantities, they may be able to qualify for even lower rates if they meet the qualification requirements for Commercial Base or Commercial Plus pricing.
• The Priority Mail one pound price is now zoned (previously mailpieces under 1 lb. were the same price, regardless of the zone). I’m not sure why the USPS would want to complicate the rate structure with this move, so we’ll see what impact it has on shipping volumes.
• There is a “new” half-pound price for Commercial Plus items.
• The USPS added new Cubic Volume Commercial Plus price tiers (5 tiers) to encourage smaller & more space-efficient packaging. Cubic Volume is based on size rather than weight: the smaller the package, the lower the price (even if it’s up to 20 lbs.). Shippers should be able to save a lot of money using this option, both in packaging materials and in shipping charges. Shippers still have the option to use the weight-based rates.