Return to Sender — For a Price

Many large volume mailers aren’t keeping their house files up to date, and that’s costing them money, according to a survey by Pitney Bowes. ■ In Nov. 2008, the U.S. Postal Service began requiring mailers to update their standard and first-class mailing lists within 95 days after a mail drop. In January, non-compliant mailers were subject to a fine of 7 cents per assessed piece of returned mail. ■ In a survey of 50 large-volume mailers, Pitney Bowes found that while 54% of respondents use the USPS’s Address Change Service to ensure new address information is returned to the mailer, only about half analyze these notices thoroughly. This means they’re missing out on key information about “undeliverable as addressed” pieces. ■ Also, when mail is returned due to incorrect addressing, 33% said they still manually update the addresses, the most costly method, the survey noted. ■ A full 46% of respondents said handling returned mail is a manually intensive process, and 22% noted that having multiple databases requiring updates is also a key constraint to updating addresses. ■ This survey, conducted in October and November, polled 50 mail operations and software development executives.