By Dennis Kaylor, Alliance of Nonprofit Mailers MTAC Representative
Megan Brennan’s opening statements reinforced the work Pat Donahoe had begun and assured the members they would continue down the path laid out by her predecessor. Megan indicated they will be focusing on consistent delivery windows. Numerous top officers have recognized Network Rationalization Phase # 2 is not currently transitioning as smoothly as they hoped for. They however are aware of the issue and are working to get service levels to where they should be based on the Phase # 2 service changes.
Work is under way to expand the Remittance Mail and Caller Service program in order to allow for quicker access to remittance mail. Current plans are to finalize the remaining 82 consolidation points outlined in Network Rationalization Phase # 2 by October 1st, 2015. Emphasis was placed on consolidation and not closures. Most places vacating their originating and destinating Letter and Flats processing will continue to provide services such as Hubs and carrier offices.
The former eBSN program is being revamped as the point of contact for those mailers qualifying to have a BSN assigned to their account. Other mailers not qualifying for BSN access will have other access to customer support. Numerous concerns were brought to their attention regarding shortfalls in the new program. Some adjustments are coming, as well as Webinars to inform the mailing industry how the new program is to work. One of the services offered under the new program is a Chat Line. Until advancements can be made on informing the mailers about the program, mailers are urged to send concerns directly to Dale Kennedy. His information can be found on the MTAC roster on the RIBBS site.
Khalid Hussain is the new manager of the Stamps Purchasing program located in Kansas City, MO. While he was not able to attend the meeting, communications were sent regarding work to move all stamps to pressure sensitive. Currently depending on the type of packaging of the stamp, i.e. sheets or rolls, many stamps still require water activation. We have been working with many of Khalid’s predecessors to be able to purchase stamps using our CAPS account. In a response to our request Khalid has indicated he will work to make CAPS a purchase options for Stamps. Dan Barrett has been assigned to Payment responsibilities under Pritha Mehra’s Team. We will be working with both Dan and Khalid to hopefully move the program along. At the same time we are hearing Dan will be looking at other postage purchases capabilities through CAPS such as PO Boxes, and other postal related services.
Nonprofit Validation is making progress, however there remain concerns around means of validating PostalOne’ s ability to link a Mail Owners CRID, MID, and NPA. A new validation tool was released on January 26th which allows a Mail Owner or Mail Service Provider to input a MID or CRID, and get back a “Yes” or “No” answer acknowledging if the MID and CRID are linked to a valid nonprofit authorization number. We continue to work with the USPS to assure all databases related to MID, CRID, and NPA data is synchronized.
In conversations with numerous Presort Software Vendors we are learning there remains confusion around how nonprofit mailings will be validated in the future. After the nonprofit reporting exception period currently in place expires, the only acceptable means of nonprofit authorization in eDoc will be the MID, CRID, or the Postage Payment permit. The Ghost number will continue to be acceptable, however the USPS is counting on the Ghost numbers going away as MSPs and Mail Owners accept the MID or CRID validation. Suggest members verify with their MSPs or Presort vendors to be certain they are prepared to move to the MID, CRID, or Postage Payment permit for validating nonprofit eligibility. Keeping in mind the NPA number will no longer be a part of the eDoc once the current exception expires. As of the February MTAC meeting no timeline has been given when the exception reporting for nonprofit mailings will be defined. We have been successful in testing the use of MIDs and CRIDs for validating nonprofit eligibility in the PostalOne Production environment. We have heard of others testing who are having issues around generating postage statements after the PostalOne upload indicates complete.
We are hearing Seamless Acceptance should be available within 60 days, however we are also hearing eInduction will be a requirement in order to participate in Seamless Acceptance. In order to extend eInduction to all USPS induction sites, the USPS has recently completed testing on the Non-Surface Visibility sites. Provided you are an approved eInduction mailer, you will no longer be required to provide 8125 forms for destination entered mail, nor is for 8017 required for origin entered mail.
Several more Guides for Mailers are being created to help mailers better understand the requirements for participation in the programs. Guides will soon be available for eInduction, Seamless Acceptance, Postage Assessment, Mailer’s Scorecard, and Thresholds. There is a guide currently available for the Mail Anywhere, Pay Anywhere program.
Testing is underway and is projected to be completed around March 23rd on Move Update, Full Service, and Seamless Acceptance. Provided SOX concerns are addressed, Seamless Acceptance may have its current moratorium lifted in March or April 2015. It is our understanding there are some revenue issues surrounding the release of the Move Update implementation on the Mailers Scorecard, which may hold up the release of invoicing around Move Update errors over the threshold until the next rate case which depending on the Appeals courts decision on the Exigent Rate case could be later in 2015 or early 2016.
IMb Full Service Electronic Verification is currently planned to begin providing invoices for review in April 2015; assessing fees is currently planned for July 2015 based on June 2015 results. For more information review the February 2015 revised Mail Entry Roadmap found on RIBBS.
Upon rollout of the invoicing program around mailers who exceed the thresholds established on the Mailer’s Scorecard, invoices will be sent out on the 11th of each month. A Mailer Owner will have 10 days to appeal the charges. If not appealed the invoice becomes past due three days after the 10 day appeal period. We recently learned invoices for less than $50.00 will not be issued. The total of all threshold violations will be taken into consideration to accumulate the $50.00 minimum.
There is much discontent with the proposed FSS pricing slated for implementation April 26th price increase. From what we learned it appears the proposed pricing is not a good fit for either the mailing Industry or the USPS. Several MTAC Associations were looking to see if anything could be done.
Anyone who accesses the Postal Explorer or RIBBS to locate the PDF format of Labeling List will find they are not currently easily accessed. Due to concerns of being able to maintain all points of access the USPS has directed all future access to Labeling list to the FAST site where all lists are maintained. To Access the PDF format go to Postal Explorer, Select Label Lists, which will take you to the FAST site, then select Resources, then select Label List Files Download, then select Label List Files at the top of the page, which will take you to the Labeling List files which prior was a direct link on the Postal Explorer.
© 2015 Alliance of Nonprofit Mailers