June 14, 2017

Alliance of Nonprofit Mailers members recently participated in the 2017 Mail Industry Survey that reveals important opportunities to improve the private sector’s use of the mail service provided exclusively by the USPS federal agency. You can download a free copy of the survey’s results here.

Idealliance, the association for the Visual Communications and Media Industry, ran the second annual survey with the support of several associations: the Alliance of Nonprofit Mailers, the American Catalog Mailers Association (ACMA), the Association for Mail Electronic Endorsement (AMEE), the Association for Postal Commerce (PostCom), the Envelope Manufacturers Association (EMA), and the National Association of Presort Mailers (NAPM).

The survey results indicate there are many low-cost, high-impact strategies that USPS should adopt to improve its financial stability and the success of all participants in the mailing ecosystem. When asked how the USPS can become an even better business partner, the top six choices by respondents were:

1. Keep postal rates predictable (48.5%)
2. Communicate more effectively on changes to processes and regulations (39.4%)
3. Increase knowledge of USPS personnel to improve accuracy and consistency (39.4%)
4. Improve mail delivery predictability and reliability (34.8%)
5. Apply rules and regulations consistently (34.8%)
6. Collaborate early with the industry on system and software design (34.1%).

The report documents numerous opportunities to take out friction and miscommunication from the mailing process overseen by USPS. Representative suggestions include:

1. “USPS management and decision-makers would benefit from spending time in mailing industry supply chain shoes to truly understand our businesses and the role the USPS plays as part of our value stream in order to better strengthen the partnership opportunities between the supply chain and USPS for growth and greater efficiencies.”
2. “Identify key partner relationships and engage them in strategic discussions before new products, services, or business functions and systems are designed. The USPS needs to understand the difference between mail ‘users’ and mailing-product suppliers and develop strategies that will enable better hand off of mail into the mail stream.”
3. “Let us sit at the planning table so we can help USPS reach their goals and reduce changes needed after the rules and policies are written.”
4. “Talk with and listen to competent mail service providers and mail owners before implementing new rules and regulations. (Example: Recent FSS pricing and zone decisions that totally misfired.)”
5. “Understand how to work with the customer/business partner. Too often USPS people forget that without the dollars supplied by the mailing industry there would be no USPS. Also, there are people in all areas, but especially in the payment entry and technology area, that forget the word SERVICE is in the name of their organization.”
6. “Talk to us. Get to know the issues we are having and help support us. Do not go behind our back and contact our customers.”
7. “Look at how they can improve the relationship not only between the MSP but also the customer. Many customers do not want to work with the post office directly.”
8. “Operate more like a business partner and less like a bureaucracy.”

We urge the USPS to pursue every opportunity described in the survey results to improve the functioning of the mailing supply chain and relationships with mail owners who pay the postage. Not only are these the right things to do; they represent the best ways to improve financial stability and to avoid unnecessary rate increases.

We greatly appreciate all who helped make this important survey a critical roadmap to a better Postal Service: Idealliance, the USPS, our members who participated, and the five other supporting organizations. Raising rates above inflation while there remains so much low-hanging fruit to pursue would be a disservice to all involved and to the American people.

Why do the main thing that drives customers away—raise prices—when there remain so many low-cost things you can do to draw customers in and keep them?