Turf Wars II
The Postal Service does not require
automation compatible mail; it requires mail that is compatible with DMM regulations.
Postal management
refuses to require automation compatible mail from its CD/DVD customers.
Postal processing plants are bogging down with CD/DVD mailpieces that conform to the DMM regulations but are not automation compatible. As more people from outside the direct mail industry decide to use the Postal Service for distribution of their optical disks, mail pieces will become even less automation compatible. Problems for processing plants continue to spiral out of control as DVD and gaming rental companies increase their volumes, marketers move Internet advertising to Multimedia Mail and a new CD/DVD (music/movie) disk swapping industry is born. One of the disk swapping companies is telling its members to print their template for a CD/DVD mailer on a sheet of 20# copy paper and staple or tape it together for mailing.
CD/DVDs are barely flexible enough to process on letter sorting machines. Plastic is not paper and almost everything the direct mail industry knows about mailpiece design for paper changes, sometimes dramatically, when a CD/DVD is added to the package. Our experience has been that minor changes in paper weight; piece length and CD placement within the package can have a major affect on automation compatibility and breakage.
While postal employees are sweeping CD/DVDs off of processing floors and pulling this mail out of the automated mail stream (preventing jams) for manual processing, upper management refuses to make the necessary changes in the DMM to insure automation compatibility. While some large companies have advocates in upper management protecting their corporate interests the operations side of the Postal Service has no such advocate. Postal costs are going up because most CD/DVD mail is not compatible with automation and must be manually processed! These increased costs will be reflected in the next rate case as all mailers pay higher rates, subsidizing the processing of CD/DVD mail. But with proper CD/DVD mail piece designs, CD/DVDs can be processed as safely and efficiently as paper only mail. Cross subsidizing this growing market and the companies that use these products is not necessary. Postal management needs to listen to their operations group and change the DMM to insure automation compatibility of this new mail.
The DMM needs a new section dealing with CD/DVDs mailed in the letter mail stream. This new section should describe several CD/DVD mailpiece designs and construction standards that postal engineers have proven to be automation compatible. Our experience says that this piece would be six inches tall, a minimum of nine inches long and constructed of 80# cover weight paper. It would be a trifold mailer with a permanently glued pocket to hold the CD, tabbed shut. A second design could be a 6x9 or longer envelope made of 24# bond paper (or heavier), as long as the CD/DVD was anchored in place in the mailpiece. Foam or velcro hubs would not be allowed. They generate a protrusion in the envelope that interferes with processing and are not able to securely hold their CDs. If a CD/DVD customer met these specifications (along with the rest of the DMM sections covering letter mail), their mail would be accepted at automated letter rates by all acceptance units. If CD/DVD mail pieces did not meet these design specifications and were not entered as an alternate certified design, they would need to be mailed as flats. This would keep all non-approved CD/DVD mail piece designs off of the letter sorting machines.
The DMM should also encourage customers to deviate from these two basic designs. To deviate from a DMM preferred design a customer would have to provide 100 samples of their mail piece for testing by postal engineers. If the engineers signed off on the design as being automation compatible, the design would be assigned a certification number and accepted for automated letter rates. The certification number and picture of the design would be posted on USPS.com as an approved CD/DVD mail piece. All certified mail pieces entered into the postal system would be required to carry the mailpiece certification number on the address side of the mailpiece. The reason for the certification number would be to identify the owner of the design. If a processing plant had problems with the machinability of a certified mail piece they would report it. A serious problem would flag the design for review and further testing. A minor problem would flag the design to be watched. The holder of the certification for the design would be notified of any problems with pictures and live samples when possible.
Through the testing and ongoing monitoring of designs, the Postal Service would only authorize the continued use of a design if there were no problems. If problems developed the owner of the design would be given a chance to submit pieces for retesting and reauthorization by postal engineers. Through certification and tracking the Postal Service would not be locked into one approval or one test but would be engaged in a program based on continual improvement insuring automation compatibility of this mail stream. If problems arose with a certified design, all projects in process would be accepted into the mail stream so that no end user would ever be impacted negatively. That said, designers would be required to fix design flaws or have their designs removed from the approved list and no longer be accepted as letters. With the emphasis on testing and tracking, the postal service would be able to gain the knowledge needed to write a set of rules guaranteeing automation compatibility of CD/DVD mail. The mailing community would not be constrained by an arbitrary set of rules that may or may not affect machinability. Innovation in mail piece design would only be constrained by limited imaginations and compatibility with processing equipment.
Todd Butler
Butler Mailing Services, Inc.
800-237-7914
513-870-5060