November 24, 2015

Pricing Update

On Monday, November 16, the USPS filed a Notice of Market-Dominant Price Adjustment to gain approval for mail promotions in 2016. The price adjustment included a zero percent price increase for First Class, Standard, and Periodical Mail.  Even though a zero percent price increase, the filing is required so that the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) can review and sign off on the USPS proposed 2016 promotions.  The PRC has 45 days until December 31 to review the filing and approve the promotions so that mailers can move forward and incorporate the promotions into their 2016 mailing plans and budgets. Nonprofits are strongly advised to take a look at these promotions.

The Competitive product category price increase for shipping packages is scheduled for January 17, 2016.  The overall increase is estimated at 9.6 percent, although some cells of products may see increases of over 20 percent.

The exigent surcharge roll-back is expected to occur sometime in early April 2016.  The USPS is mandated to supply the public with a 45 day notice of the date they intend to change the prices.  The surcharge is to be removed at a straight 4.3 percent per rate cell.

Visibility and Service Performance

Robert Cintron reported that a revamp of the Intelligent Mail Barcode (IMb) Planning tool is in process.  Currently the tool provides mailers a five-day rear view mirror look at delivery performance as a percentage of early, on time, and late mail along with a 12 week rolling average at an entry level. The new tool will be reorganized with a focus on ease of use providing robust information on the current service standings at each processing facility in a view to include all processing locations. Mailers will have the ability to view “work in process” for each facility for better planning drop shipments of mail to meet desired “in home” delivery dates. Updates to tool may be posted as early as 30 days.

Robert and his team are planning for a full roll-out of Informed Visibility in Quarter 3 of 2016. This program will provide a complete view of pieces in trays, trays on pallets, and pallet acceptance through the entire network.

Steve Deering presented service scores for Quarter 1 to date.

• Standard Mail Letters: 92.65 percent for Sectional Center Facility (SCF), 91.88 percent for Network Distribution Center (NDC) on time. The largest opportunity for improvement remains in the end-to-end processing (mail entered at origin facility and transported by the USPS). These pieces are currently being reported at 62 percent on time.
• Standard Mail Flats: 81.96 percent for SCF, 85.96 percent for NDC. The largest opportunity for improvement remains in the end-to-end processing (mail entered at origin facility and transported by the USPS.) These pieces are currently being reported at 54 percent on time.
• Periodicals: 82.25 percent on time
• Q4 2015 combined Standard Mail met targeted 91 percent, Periodical mail actual was 83.3 percent, missing the targeted 91 percent, First Class presort overnight at 96.2 percent, and 3 day at 94.8 percent missed targets.  2 day at 97.3 percent met targeted 96.5 percent.

Business Reply Mail (BRM) – the consideration is being researched to barcode the pieces by the Mailer ID instead of a unique +4 zip code.

Coding Accuracy Support System (CASS) Cycle “N” – the expiration date has extended to August 1, 2018 since there is no compelling need to move to cycle “O” at this time.

Intelligent Mail parcel barcode – for Shipper Paid Forwarding or Shipper Paid Return the mailer must submit Shipping Services File (SSF) with version 1.7 or higher. This option is available for the following: Parcel Select, Parcel Select Lightweight, Media and Library Mail, Bound Printed Matter, and Standard Mail Parcels.

Mail Prep and Entry

Linda Malone noted that coverage for the peak fall/holiday mailing season will be in affect beginning the week of November 23, 2015 and will extend through the week of January 4, 2016. In addition, all Air Mail Centers and Surface Transfer Centers will be fully staffed to accommodate the influx of packages expected during this period.

Isaac Cronkite reviewed mail conditions after the first holiday of the 2015 holiday season – Columbus Day. There was not a decline versus the same period last year (SPLY) reported for Standard Mail the day after; however, Periodicals experienced a 44 percent increase in delays compared to 2014, likely due to Critical Entry Times (CETs) put in place for Periodicals at 17:00.

Christina Obeldobbel noted the PDF/Customer Service Variance (CSV) download file for labeling lists from Facility Access and Shipment Tracking (FAST) is delayed until after January 3, 2016. A discrepancy in labeling list L009 and L011 was identified and corrected. This misalignment of NDC facilities affected 211 zip codes. The USPS will add four facilities to the network in order for each NDC service area to have a dedicated facility to process the mixed outgoing mail volumes.

Small Parcel Sorting System (SPSS) – 21 more of these machines will be up and running for the peak season. The USPS will deploy six more after the peak season.

Mail Transport Equipment – The USPS noted there is a small deficit of sleeves. They encouraged any mailers that have them on hand and do not need then to return to the network. This can be done by contacting your local processing facility or by emailing mteor@usps.gov. As a reminder, one pallet of Managed Mail (MM) Sleeves equals three pallets of MM Trays and one pallet of Half Tray Sleeves equals three pallets of Half Tray Trays. Keep this in mind when ordering supplies.

Product Development

Gary Reblin committed to an earlier release for 2017 mail promotions. This information will be released in the July 2016 time frame so that mailers will have more time to prepare for participation in promotions.  Any issues with promotions can be reported to User Group 8. Gary and his team are working on a rebrand and relaunch of the Alternate Postage program. This will now be known as Share Mail: Enable Customers to Promote Your Business. This program will work like Business Reply Mail, but instead of the mail pieces being returned to one location they will be sent out to others by the original mail recipient.

The USPS presented the Proposed 2016 Promotion Calendar, providing detail on each program, along with registration dates, and promotion periods.

The Informed Delivery pilot in the New York City metro area was kicked off on November 18, 2015. The zip codes included in this pilot are: 066, 069, and 100-119.  This offering allows the subscriber to receive an email each morning with the digital images of the covers of that day’s physical mailbox contents.

Payment and Acceptance

The USPS has posted a Mail Entry Road Map. This guide describes the Postal Service’s key initiatives to streamline the acceptance, induction, and verification of nonprofit and commercial mailings, providing a timeline on each.

Pritha Mehra noted some updates on the e-Induction program, namely that participation is at 52 percent.  A fix was deployed on October 30, 2015 for mis-ships that occurred in the month of October.  Also, any cancelation or partial cancelation of a postage statement must be performed two hours before the container is entered. This is because pre-validations performed by PostalOne! could lead to duplicate barcode errors.

A new document titled Streamlined Mail Entry for Letters and Flats will be made available and hosted on the National Customer Support Center–RIBBS shortly. The document will be in draft format accepting comments through December. This document will replace the guides available for Full-Service, E-Induction, Seamless Acceptance, Postage Assessment and Move Update.

Full-Service Intelligent Mail is at 88 percent adoption (of Full Service eligible mail). Assessments will go into effect on July 1, 2016 for the June Mailer Scorecard data. Mailer Scorecards will be available to test as of December 1, 2015. Any issues found should be reported.

The Mail Evaluation Readability Lookup INstrument (MERLIN) has started to be retired. The USPS will need to resort to manual verifications until all are fully migrated to the Seamless environment.

Finally, USPS likes to name and acronym just about everything, and is working on more.