Tag: North America

US Post offices host passport fairs

Posted by | Jun 2, 2007 | |

It wasn’t long ago that all an American needed to skip over the border to Mexico or Canada was a driver’s license.

But with the passage of new laws governing travel in North America, venturing to those countries has become more complicated.

Congress crafted the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative in late 2005 to tighten security on the Canadian and Mexican borders.

To help remedy the situation and make the process easier, the Mountain View and Millbrae post offices are hosting fairs Saturday that offer one-stop shopping for passport seekers.

There will be photographers on hand and post office employees will walk applicants through the process, U.S. Postal Service spokesman James Wigdel said.

Currently, those traveling by air must hold passports, while those going by sea or land won’t need the documents until January, said Roxanne Hercules of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency.

Since the new rules took effect, the number of people seeking the navy blue books that allow Americans to travel abroad has doubled to roughly 17 million annually – extending the time it takes to obtain a passport to three months in some cases.

“It used to take four to six weeks” for a passport to be issued, Wigdel said. “Now it’s 10 to 12 weeks.”

Nationally, the U.S. Postal Service is expected to help process 14 million of about 17.7 million passport requests this year.

In the San Francisco region, which includes Silicon Valley, 3,500 passports are processed every week, officials said.

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USPS begins ‘slim jim’ testing

Posted by | May 31, 2007 | |

Earlier this month the U.S. Postal Service began testing to develop better standards for letter-size booklets, also known as “slim jim” catalogs. The USPS is also cautioning catalogers who may be considering switching to a slim-jim format that the mailing standards for these pieces are likely to change.

As more catalogers may switch to the lower-priced format in light of the current rate increase, the agency is concerned that printers need more precise mailing standards to avoid fabricating slim jims that would jam the agency’s delivery bar code sorters.

“About two weeks ago we started testing sample slim jims from printers to get a better idea of how to best develop standards for the slim jims,” said Barry Walsh, operations specialist at the USPS. “It is hard to tell which factor s are causing problems, whether it is tab positioning, tab strength or thickness, for example.”

Slim jims measure up to 6.125 inches by 11.5 inches. The USPS considers them folded self-mailers and booklets. If they weigh 3 ounces or less and are tabbed they are the largest size qualifying for letter-rate postage, which is significantly lower than recently increased Standard Mail flats postage.

The USPS has said there are not many slim jims in the system now and that, when they do appear in USPS facilities, postal employees frequently put them through the more robust AFSM-100 flats sorter as opposed to the delivery bar code sorters, which handle letter mail. However, to get the lower rates, they will have to be able to go through the delivery bar code sorter machine.

USPS is testing whether features such as thickness and tab strength on the mail pieces will have to change to ensure they are able to run on the DBCS machine. Each combination of characteristics being tested requires a specially fabricated test deck of 500 booklets that are uniform in all characteristics not tested, Mr. Walsh said.

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Pitney Bowes acquires Digital Cement Inc.

Posted by | May 31, 2007 | |

Pitney Bowes Inc. announced the successful completion of the acquisition of Digital Cement Inc. for approximately USD 40 million in cash. Digital Cement is a professional services firm that provides relationship management strategy and services to help companies acquire, retain, manage and grow their customer relationships. In October 2006, Pitney Bowes made an initial investment of USD 12 million in Digital Cement, resulting in a minority ownership position and a strategic partnership to market its services. Digital Cement will become part of the company’s Marketing Services business led by Mark Cattini.

Digital Cement provides Fortune 500 clients in consumer packaged goods, telecom, financial services, retail and health care industries, such as Kraft, FedEx and John Hancock, with a suite of consultative offerings including:
— strategic planning to address business needs,
— customer experience planning to maximize customer lifetime value,
— channel and platform integration to deliver unified customer communications, and
— customer analytics to ensure that marketing programs achieve their desired results

Digital Cement employs 121 people, most of whom are located in its headquarters in Toronto, Canada.

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USPS International Service Center honoured with Certificate of Excellence

Posted by | May 31, 2007 | |

The International Service Center (ISC) in Miami, Fla., is being recognized with an International Post Corporation (IPC) Certificate of Excellence for exceeding the highest international standards in mail processing.

Paul Vogel, managing director and senior vice president of global business for the Postal Service, said the honor is particularly noteworthy because it marks certification of all five international centers. Chicago’s J.T. Weeker ISC was certified in 2004, the New York (JFK) ISC was certified in 2006, the Los Angeles and San Francisco ISCs were certified earlier this year, and Miami joins the list today.

“The U.S. Postal Service is the first national post worldwide to earn IPC certification of its entire international processing network,” said Vogel.

Achieving certification is a year-long process that includes stringent on-site reviews to verify that nearly 200 standards are met. The IPC awards certification for a three-year period, and conducts periodic validation to ensure that a facility maintains its high performance levels.

The Miami center employs more than 280 people and processes more than 24 million pounds of mail per year.

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Amazon.ca Teams with Canada Post to Deliver the Final Harry Potter Book to Customers' Doorsteps on July 21 for the Same Price as Express Shipping

Posted by | May 30, 2007 | |

Just as it has done for previous Harry Potter books, Amazon.ca today confirmed that it has teamed with Canada Post to deliver “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” to the doorsteps of excited fans across Canada on Saturday, July 21, the same day the book goes on sale to the public. Release-date delivery, which is the same price as Amazon.ca’s express shipping, is guaranteed to qualified addresses in Canada or the cost of the book will be refunded.

Offered at $22.50, a 50 percent discount, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” became Amazon.ca’s current No. 1 bestselling book the same day it became available for pre-order on February 1, 2007. Amazon.ca saw an 825 percent increase in first-day pre-orders of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” compared to the sixth book. The seventh and final book has been so popular with Amazon.ca customers that the online retailer sold more copies of it in the first 30 hours than the company did of the sixth book in the first 30 days of its pre-order period.

To place an order for “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” and to explore Amazon.ca’s entire selection of Harry Potter products – including books, DVDs, computer and video games, journals and stationery, and more – visit www.amazon.ca/harrypotter.

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