How Do Print And Mail Providers Use Mail Barcoding? Outsource print and mail providers incorporate mail barcoding into their workflows in 2 key ways: by using IMBs and by using 2D barcodes. Before an envelope leaves the production floor, print vendors attach an Intelligent Mail Barcode (IMB) to its surface. These barcodes track each mailpiece throughout the mailstream, from facility departure to final delivery. Within printing facilities, 2D barcodes are printed on individual sheets of paper, and are used to ensure documents are placed in the right envelope, every time. They also record who handles which documents, when, and at [...]

Why Should You Outsource Print And Mail Services? The decision to work with a print and mail provider is one made with careful consideration. This guide will help you see if outsource printing and outsource mailing is the right choice for you. Read on to discover the answers to some of the most common questions about the process, and to explore 5 of the strongest reasons you should work with an external vendor.   Reason 1: USPS Expertise Knowing how the postal service works can net you significant price savings, but navigating USPS requirements can be complex without an expert. [...]

Keep Your Document Printing Secure How do you know that your documents are being handled, printed, and mailed safely? This guide makes it easier to find out. Throughout this blog, we'll discover the protocols that print and mail vendors put in place to safeguard client data. These controls include end-to-end encryption, individual mailpiece tracking, and company-wide security training. D4 Solutions' Secure Document Printing Checklist, provided at the beginning of this post, helps you analyze your print processes. If your workflows contain all the elements on this checklist, then they do an effective job of keeping your clients' information protected. We've also [...]

Key Takeaways #10 envelopes are the most commonly used envelopes for business communications. The size of a standard #10 envelope is 4 1/8" x 9 1/8", and it is able to hold trifolded letter-size sheets of paper. These envelopes are extremely versatile and are used to deliver various types of documents across almost every industry. When designing these mailers, you must follow USPS requirements surrounding layout and color contrast. If you need documents delivered to your customers and clients accurately and securely, D4 Solutions is a print and mail vendor with 45 years of experience that can help you handle [...]

Key Takeaways Permit imprint is a USPS-approved way to prepay for mailings without having to manually attach stamps or metered postage, making it ideal for high-volume shipments of letters.   First-Class Mail shipments using this service must contain at least 500 envelopes.   Permit imprint indicia must contain certain pieces of required wording and be placed in the upper right corner of the envelope.   Each mailpiece sent with this program must be the same weight, as this allows the USPS to verify postage by weighing bundles or entire trays.   In order to use permit imprint, you need to [...]

Introduction How do you get your customers and clients to reply to your mail? If you're collecting customer payments, non-profit donations, or responses to promotional material, you might be able to solve this dilemma by using business reply envelopes, also called BREs. If customers are required to pay postage on a return envelope, they might be disincentivized from sending one. Business reply envelopes solve this problem. The organization pays the postage cost for any BREs that are returned, and, since the customer isn’t charged for sending these mailings, it's easier for them to do so. BREs are conveniently placed inside [...]

Introduction Processes as important as elections require thorough behind-the-scenes work. Most voters don't think about ballot printing during election season, but it's a task that needs to be completed properly in order for voting to run smoothly. Before every election, county officials determine how ballot printing will be handled for voters in their jurisdiction. They consider the needs of those voting in-person as well as those voting by mail, and they ensure that ballots are produced securely and with accurate information. This blog shows you how they do it. In this blog, we'll discuss the types of ballots that county [...]

Introduction If you’re in an industry where compliance and security are top concerns, then every decision you make regarding patient data must be carefully thought out. Data exposures and breaches can lead to compliance violations and fines, but also to the loss of the trust customers place in you when they provide you with their data. These concerns extend to the printing and mailing of sensitive communications. You might have found this blog post because you know that the use of pressure seal forms safeguards client and customer data in ways that no other envelope type can. This is because [...]

Introduction Have you ever wondered how personalized documents are developed? It doesn’t usually involve the manual creation of individual documents, at least not for firms with high volumes of customers. Editing data points by hand for hundreds or thousands of documents a month would be a time-consuming and labor-intensive process in the best of cases, and for many large organizations it would be completely impossible. Document composition is one of the ways that personalized documents are created at scale. It's a key part of variable data printing workflows. It involves taking data from a customer database and automatically merging it [...]

Introduction In an ideal world, once you send documents to your customers, clients, or patients, the printing and mailing process is mostly done. You can be relieved that your communications will get to where they need to be on time, in accordance with compliance requirements, and you can move onto other pressing tasks. Which is why, if you see that same mailpiece returned to you with the marking “undeliverable as addressed,” it can feel dejecting. Now, not only do you have to put this mailpiece through your mailing workflow again, but you have to spend time determining why your USPS [...]