In recent years the United States Postal Service (USPS) has made many changes to how they process and deliver your mail. In this newsletter we want to introduce you to “Move Update” and the importance of staying compliant. PCI is committed to providing our clients the information so you can understand the mailing process and ensure your mail pieces have the best chance of being delivered in the most cost effective manner.
MOVE UPDATE STANDARD
The purpose of the USPS Move Update standard is to reduce the number of mail pieces that require forwarding (once in the mailstream) or pieces being returned as Undeliverable As Addressed (UAA) (after mailing) – we commonly refer to this mail as “return mail”.
The Move Update standard is met when the debtor mailing address is processed through National Change of Address (NCOALink) process within 95 days of the actual mailing date.
Prior to mailing – To ensure you stay in compliance with Move Update – PCI processes your address file through USPS NCOALink  in an attempt to update your addresses to the most current address known to USPS.  Since this process is run prior to printing your letters, any address updates found will be printed directly on your letter. PCI transmits an address file containing all updated records to your office.
Starting April 1st 2015, PCI will be upgrading from the 18 month NCOALink to the 48 month NCOALink database. No changes are necessary on your side, all the codes and process will be the same.
After the mailing – The second part of compliance is updating your address database with address updates from UAA and mail forwards (return mail). All of our clients utilize Electronic Address Change Service (Electronic ACS) with PCI. This allows you to receive your return mail via an electronic file. Please make sure you are applying these updates to your database.
For Legal Purposes – Many clients inform PCI they have to 
utilize the original “raw address” given by their clients.
If you need to mail to the “raw address” – you can add a flag to your record that informs PCI to mail to the “raw address” and not utilize the NCOALink update if applicable. PCI will still process your file through NCOALink process and compare your “raw address” against the NCOALink address. If there is a new address update – we will use your original “raw address” on your outgoing letter. Any records mailed to the “raw address” that have an address update will not qualify for discounted mail and will have to mail full rate (any affected letters will incur a postage up-charge  – not the whole file – just the few letters that have an address update). We don’t expect to up-charge many letters during this process.