The United States Postal Service recently announced changes to the format and handling of postage statements, effective in March 2010. The format of the statements will be changing to reflect the conversion of Bulk Mail Centers (BMCs) to Network Distribution Centers (NDCs). The handling of the statements will change for hard copy statements vs. electronic statements, and these handling differences will depend on whether or not the acceptance unit is connected to the PostalOne! system.

Statement Format Changes
Now that the conversion from BMCs to NDCs has been fully implemented, the USPS will be modifying the verbiage on the postage statements to reflect this change. For example, in many classes of mail, the USPS offers drop-ship discounts to mailers who transport mail to postal facilities closer to the final destination of the mail. These discounts apply to mail transported to Bulk Mail Centers (BMCs), Sectional Center Facilities (SCFs), Area Distribution Centers (ADCs) and Destination Delivery Units (DDUs). Although the discount dollar values have not changed, the Destination BMC discounts will now be referred to as Destination NDC discounts on the postage statements.

Statement Handling Changes: Hard Copies
As part of their ongoing efforts to encourage mailers to submit postage statements and other postal documentation electronically, the USPS plans to modify the way they process hard copy and electronic postage statements. For mailers who submit hard copy postage statements at acceptance units equipped with PostalOne!, the USPS will no longer manually complete the "USPS section" of the statements, nor will they be manually stamping the statements with the red round date-stamp. In lieu of this manually applied information, mailers are encouraged to access any required receipts or mailing transaction information from the PostalOne! dashboard. At acceptance units not equipped with PostalOne!, the USPS will continue to manually complete the USPS sections of the statements and apply the round date-stamp.

Statement Handling Changes: Electronic
There will be no changes in the handling of electronically submitted postage statements. However, there are some proposed changes to the format of the electronic receipt file currently available. When submitting postage statements electronically, mailers can access the transaction information via the Business Customer Gateway. The transaction information can be manually accessed, or can be downloaded in the form of a receipt file containing the transaction information. In the March release of the PostalOne! software, the USPS plans to offer additional information in these receipt files. Some of the new information includes:

• CRID of the submitter of the Mail.datfiles 
• Mail Group ID 
• Cust-Group-ID 
• Total pieces 
• Total copies 
• Total postage 
• Final Clerk Initials 
• CAPS account number 
• CAPS tax ID

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