Vision marks blue sky innovation for Secured Mail

Secured Mail has introduced new cloud technology which has removed the challenge of handling multiple barcoded items and created a system which allows for sorting items “faster, smarter and at radically reduced cost”. Secured Mail’s Operations Director James Wilkins commented: “The system’s development came in response to challenges in integrating with customers’ own formats, particularly where their IT resource was stretched and unable to engage fully. We wanted to speed up the process of aligning our systems with theirs.

“We can now take any customer’s information from a pre-existing barcode. We can determine dimensions and weight and call in links to the address on the customer’s pre-advice files; so now we know the item’s destination too.”

“Our scanners sit over the sorter (this reads the barcode) asks for a match and receives the postcode in real-time. Tracking is also enhanced.”

The new routing technology took just two weeks and minimal investment to develop; money that was recouped within the first month of operation.

Wilkins added: “Many solutions are software based and have been produced to integrate software for multiple carriers. The software identifies the cheapest rates for sending parcels and offers a look-up table for dimensions and weight. This works for the larger retailers because they have the technical expertise and want the cheapest route to reliable delivery and optimal label production at the cheapest rate.

“Now we don’t need to integrate, and we’ve got around the problem of parcels with multiple barcodes, single barcodes and no technology department. We simply explored how we could route a parcel via a barcode – often where there was no sensible information for us to access – and how we could use the information it did carry to generate what we needed.”