July 26, 2016

We appreciate Deborah Damore and Steve Smith representing the Alliance at the July Mailers Technical Advisory Committee meeting. Please feel free to email either if you have questions.

Pritha Mehra, VP, Mail Entry and Payment Technology shared with the group that full service postage assessments invoicing will begin in November using October data. Invoices will be emailed to the Verification Assessment Evaluator (VAE) on the 11th day of the month. The Streamlined Mail Acceptance Publication was published on July 1, 2016. It is available on http://beta.postalpro.usps.com/.

Full Service Assessments include:

• Mailer ID
• STID
• By/For
• Barcode Uniqueness
• Entry Facility
• Unlinked Copal

The USPS has begun to do physical nesting verifications on mailings at the DMU and BMEU. There is a computer-generated random selection of pallets and trays that the USPS then checks to confirm proper tray to pallet assignment. Errors are being recorded on the Seamless tab of the mailers score card. These are currently not being postage assessed.

The Premier BMEU program has been renamed as Business Solutions Centers. Phase One is complete with 28 sites certified, Phase Two has begun and is scheduled to bring on an additional 60 sites.

Gary Reblin, VP, New Products and Innovation shared that an additional 35,000 households have been identified to on board with the Informed Delivery (ID) program, bringing the total to over 100,000.

Gary gave an informed delivery update based on the early adopters in the pilot test. ID is achieving an over 70 percent open rate daily; over 90 percent open rate every 4 days; the unsubscribe rate is single digit (not single digit percentage, but actual single digits); over a 90 percent approval rating; and over 40 percent of the people now on informed delivery are saying that they are not the usual person seeing the mail, which means they are new impressions, so expanding the current possible customer base.

The ID program is still currently only active in Northern Virginia, New York City, and Connecticut. The USPS plans in 2017 to roll in additional cities.

The 2017 mailing promotions have been approved by the Postal Regulatory Commission. The calendar is available on RIBBS.  the USPS reminded attendees that completing the survey at the conclusion of the promotion period is a requirement, and should prove very helpful in development of future promotions.

Sharon Owens, VP, Pricing and Costing presented to the group some of the proposed January 2017 product concepts and potential structural changes concurrent with the rate case. Sharon shared these planned dates. She emphasized “no surprises.”

• 7/12-7/13: share key concepts with MTAC
• August: share technical changes and draft postage statements (without pricing) with developers
• August: share draft mailing standards
• September/October: Final PRC Market Dominant filing
• November: Competitive filings
• November/December: Publish final prices, mailing standards
• 1/8/17: target implement pre-release
• 1/22/17: targeting price effective date

Potential Changes

First Class

• Combine AADC and 3D auto letters for First-Class Presort.
• 3rd Ounce free for First-Class commercial letters.
• First-Class Mail promotions.

Standard Mail

• Combine AADC and 3D auto letters for Standard Mail presort.
• Simplify Standard Auto letters by eliminating the per-pound rate between 3.3 and 3.5 ounces. Letters would be the same price from 0 up to 3.5 ounces, as they have been for the last year, but the additional rate cells would be removed from postage statements.
• Increase Standard Mail flats piece price weight break from 3.3 to 4.0 ounces.
• Adjust Standard Mail forwarding fee to two decimal places.
• Standard Mail promotions.
• FSS Standard Mail revert to previous structure (FSS preparation rules will still be required for Standard flats, BPM, and Periodicals, but it is proposed that the pricing structure revert to allow for CR rates in FSS zones).

Periodicals

• FSS Periodicals revert to previous structure.

Financial, volume, and service update

May YTD                        FY 2016              SPLY       Change

Volume (pieces)                    105.1B               105.5B           -0.4B

Revenue                                $48.4B               $46.9B        +$1.5B

Volume changes YTD

• First-Class Single Piece down 3.7%
• FCM Presort down 0.6%
• Standard down 0.2%
• Periodicals down 3.5%
• Shipping and Package up 13.8%

Service Measurement

• Standard Mail on time service is up 3%, Q3 95.6%, YTD 91.9%
• Standard DSCF Letters on time service is up 3.6%, Q3 96.7%, YTD is at 94.1%
• Standard DSCF Flats on time service is up 1.2%, Q3 90.9%, YTD 83.3%. Q3
• Standard DNDC letter Mail on time service is up 3.3%, Q3 95.7%, YTD of 93%
• Standard DNDC Flats on time service is up 2.37%, Q3 93.5%, YTD 87.8%
• Periodicals on time service is up 0.72%, Q3 86.8%, YTD of 83.4%
• First Class on time service is up 4.8%, YTP 92.3%

The USPS now provides graph and table layouts for customers to customize and view the Postal Service’s most recent quarterly report of area and district-level data as well as historical quarterly performance trends going back to Quarter 2, Fiscal Year 2015.  Link found here.

Fall update

The USPS is anticipating a heavier than usual fall mailing season due to the political mailings expected. David Williams, Chief Operating Officer and EVP, reassured the attendees that USPS is ready with extensive training and outreach to the field, as well as plenty of MTE inventory on hand to meet the fall mailing season demand.

Below are the links for the USPS presentations and notes from the July MTAC Focus Group Meetings:

• July 2016 Meeting Presentations
• July 2016 Focus Group Meeting notes

Below are the links to the USPS presentations from the July MTAC Stakeholders Open Session: