Swiss Post Solutions opens mail screening plant in New York
Swiss Post Solutions has opened a new secure mail screening facility in the New York City metropolitan area, which will protect major businesses in the area from threats in their mailstream. The project will seek to build on corporate demand for the outsourcing of mail security, providing a line of defence for letters and parcels en route to companies such as those on Wall Street.
The new facility is being run in partnership with Michael Stapleton Associates (MSA) Security, which has helped set up the plant and train staff, and is in close contact with the facility in case threats are identified.
Screening systems operating around the clock include x-ray technology, bomb dogs and detection technologies for weapons of mass destruction, to identify explosives, chemical or radiological weapons.
SPS, part of the global business services unit run by the Swiss national postal company, told Post&Parcel today that its new facility is capable of processing 250,000 mail items a day, but can be easily scaled up depending on demand.
The company said with parent group Swiss Post behind it, it would have the capabilities of opening further facilities in the US if there is sufficient demand.
Security
Tom Carroll, the service director at Swiss Post Solutions, Inc., said the new facility was particularly geared to the rising security concerns among the financial business sector.
He said the plant could be scaled up with areas dedicated to certain clients, or shared between clients as required.
“Security is a hot topic for organisations like this around the world,” he said, noting the bomb scare at the Manhattan headquarters of Credit Suisse last month, when two suspicious packages were found, leading to a partial evacuation of the building.
While the packages received at Credit Suisse turned out to be no danger, a bomb was intercepted at Deutsche Bank’s headquarters in Frankfurt, Germany, the week before the Credit Suisse incident.
Carroll said today: “A lot of organisations currently do their screening on-site, but once that threat is found it can shut the whole business down, as people are evacuated to deal with the threat. By moving the screening off-site, it allows the screening to take place away from the business – it may delay slightly the receiving of that mail, but it won’t shut down the entire business.”
The SPS service director said partnering with New York-based MCA Security on the facility was an important relationship, since although the company operates around the world, it has a strong presence locally to the new facility.
“They are a good partner for us,” said Carroll. “They trained our people and if we have identified something we can notify them, and they have a link through to the technology in the plant, so they can instantly view the item in question and take a decision on it.”
Swiss Post Solutions has its corporate offices in New York City, as well as offices in Chicago, Los Angeles and Washington DC. The company provides a range of outsourcing and digitization services, from mail and document processing and archiving to IT, call centre services and accounts processing.
