Three Ways to Reduce Postage Costs

24 Jun Three Ways to Reduce Postage Costs

One of our goals at DATAMATX is to always keep you up to date on the latest news from the United States Postal Service (USPS). Keeping that in mind we’d like to give a few details on the postage rate increase filed by the USPS on May 28, 2021, likely to go into effect on August 29^th of this year.

For business mailers, where mail is metered, the average increase in First Class postage will be between 7.0% and 7.8%. We know this is definitely not news anyone likes to hear, including us, but we want to assure you our efforts to keep postage in check are ongoing through legislative change and lobbying as well as through the NPPC (National Postal Policy Council) where we have partnered alongside some of the largest mailers in our nation that include State Farm Insurance, JP Morgan/Chase, AT&T, Verizon, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Comcast working to combat postage increase.

For those of you that mail high-volume bills and statements, the cost of postage is always a concern, which is why we are always looking for ways to lower those costs. Here are three ways that we can work together to save:

1. Optimizing Your Mailing Strategy

Looking at the positive side, the USPS allows you to add a second or even a third ounce to each First Class mail item at a rate that is almost half of what it would cost to do a separate mailing. Those mailing First Class automation presort letters can significantly reduce mailing costs by taking advantage of the USPS 3rd Ounce Free program. There is just one price for pieces weighing up to 3.5 ounces, (i.e. another ounce and half “free”). Businesses can now put marketing pieces and promotional messages into statements, bills and other transactional documents and mail them at attractive rates. And because First Class mail gets opened and bills get reviewed, you have a captive audience for the marketing messages you mail with them.

2. DATAMATX Total Quality Management (DXTQM) Saves

We hold ourselves to the highest of standards and best practices in order to offer you the most error-free service possible and take advantage of any available postal discounts. We have broken our overall production process into a series of steps, each with procedures designed to uniquely identify, monitor and track customer files and to catch any duplicates or errors.

3. Have close ties with the USPS

As one of the first mailers in the country to earn the rigorous USPS Platinum Full-Service Certification,  we know how to take advantage of the  most cost-efficient mailing techniques. Since mail is an integral part of your business, developing a good relationship with the USPS is one sure way for both of us to keep your business running smoothly and  your cost down. Here are a few comprehensive tools that we implement to help reduce postage:

• Intelligent Mail Barcode (IMb) – The USPS next generation barcode is used to sort and track letters and flats and reap the greatest automation postal discounts available.
• Move Update – This service makes it possible to maintain the highest quality of address accuracy and avoid wasted costs due to undeliverable-as-addressed mailings.
• Address Management– The latest USPS software is used to update mailing addresses prior to mailing using real-time change of address information.
• Presort Discounts
• Electronic Return Mail Solutions
• Co-mingling and Co-Palletization
• High Volume Discounts
• Utilization of 6×9 Envelopes for multi-page statements

Most importantly, at DATAMATX we are dedicated to a lifetime of learning and listening so that we can continue to be experts in our industry as well as create money-saving solutions for our customers. As we continue to track the postage increases,  we will keep you informed and seek out ways to bolster your bottom line.