Trends in transactional communications reveal that more companies are choosing to contract with providers for print and mail. Document outsourcing companies have the expertise, technology, and efficiency required to excel at this, but they aren’t all the same.

Before you sign a contract, review these tips and insights.

What Are Document Outsourcing Companies?

Document outsourcing companies describe businesses that work in commercial printing and mailing. In this instance, the documents are transactional, which means they contain sensitive or protected information.

Those organizations that focus on these services deliver quality, accuracy, security, and compliance to ensure streamlined production.

X Things to Know Before You Say Yes

Evaluating the options available for outsourcing requires a detailed look at what they provide and how they deliver it. These are the key considerations to consider before you make a choice.

1. Saving Money Arises from Economies of Scale

You can reduce costs associated with print and mail. You’ll eliminate any internal technology, equipment, space, and labor when you outsource. Those are considerable savings, but you’ll see better rates for manufacturing and postage.

The per-piece pricing from vendors reflects economies of scale related to materials. They can lock in rates for these things because of the volume they use.

Postage rates also decrease with outsourcing. At the volume providers manufacture, they can secure the lowest price because they use presorting and commingling strategies.

Additionally, many transactional print and mail companies also leverage address hygiene tools to validate addresses. As a result, you’ll have a much lower cost for undeliverable mail.

2. Enhancing Data Security Must Be a Priority

Every company that handles customer data must have data security protocols. Some are more layered than others. You should make assessments based on how robust it is. Ask a lot of questions around this topic, including:

• How do they secure perimeters?
• What type of encryption do they use?
• How do they handle secure uploads of files?
• What proactive cybersecurity tactics do they use?
• How often do they audit their data security strategy?

3. Ensuring Compliance Should Be Part of Everything

Compliance is non-negotiable in transactional communications. One or more regulations dictate how companies should protect the data. Having compliance certifications is a good baseline, but your provider should go beyond this.

Those companies that emphasize compliance make it part of every workflow and audit processes regularly. They identify and address any errors promptly.

You’ll also have a record of every job should a regulatory body require this. This documentation proves you and your provider have followed all applicable regulations.

Another pro to look for is whether the vendor has dedicated compliance resources like a compliance officer. If they do, this should offer you further peace of mind.

4. Dynamic Printing Allows for Customization

Dynamic printing enables customized printing on every page. It’s not just billing or personal information that can be unique. You can also personalize messaging on each document that cross-sells, upsells, or informs.

Not all print and mail companies can do this at scale. Some may require pre-printing or inserts, which increase costs.

Seek out a provider that can deliver this capability, so you can increase customer engagement.

5. Accuracy Depends on Technology and Processes

Another component of document outsourcing companies is how accurate they are in delivering the right information to the correct addressee. Mis-mailings are common and could impact customer trust and be cited as non-compliance.

The best ways to strengthen accuracy involve technology and processes. For technology, the approach of intelligent insertion boosts accuracy. Each piece of paper contains a printed 2D barcode. A camera scans that and then informs the inserter of which pages to fold into each envelope. Another camera captures this for verification.

The process also matters. Insertion is usually automated because of the volume, but the entire workflow that starts with data delivery must be optimized for accuracy. Many providers apply standard works to these processes. These document all the steps for each part of the process so that everything is consistent and repeatable.

Document Outsourcing Services from PCI Group

We’re the leader in transactional communications. It’s our sole purpose, and we continue to improve every part of production. We prioritize security, compliance, and accuracy. Let’s talk about how we can help you reduce costs and improve processes.

FAQs

What are document outsourcing companies?

Document outsourcing companies are businesses that provide print and mail services to organizations. They manage the entire workflow, ensuring data is secure and compliance mandates are followed.

What are address hygiene tools?

Address hygiene tools validate addresses using the USPS Intelligent Mail Barcode (IMb). They identify incomplete, duplicative, or incorrect addresses. If new information is available, the tools update it.

What’s a good accuracy rating for transactional print and mail?

A good accuracy rating for transactional print and mail is 99.9999%. This number represents the industry’s leading accuracy rating, and PCI Group is the organization that has earned this.

What is dynamic printing?

Dynamic printing allows for each document in the job to be custom. It’s not just the billing or personal information that is unique. Messaging, graphics, callouts, and more can vary depending on the addressee. With dynamic printing, you can eliminate the need for inserts.

For companies choosing to outsource transaction communications, they often begin the process with an RFP (request for proposal). These documents enable a fact-finding mission to compare options and make the best selection. But what should you include in a print and mail RFP?

With decades of experience in this space, we’ve responded to our fair share of RFPs from many industries—healthcare, insurance, utilities, telecom, finance, and ARM. There are nuances depending on your sector, but many of the RFP questions should be consistent across them.

In this post, we’ll share the most important RFP queries to include.

Questions to Include in a Print and Mail RFP

In general, you can group these questions into capabilities, onboarding, compliance, security, accuracy, postage, and quality. We’ll categorize them by these labels.

Capabilities

You need to know what this printer can do and at what capacity, along with information about production workflows.

• What is their current capacity across locations, and how do you handle peak usage?
• What equipment do they use for printing, inserting, and mailing?
• How do they source materials, and do they have guaranteed access to quantities (paper, ink, toner)?
• What is the print and mail workflow?
• What is the communication and escalation process should there be an error?
• Do they have dynamic printing capabilities?
• What type of manufacturing frameworks do they use (e.g., Lean Manufacturing)?
• What’s the protocol if there’s a disaster or downtime?

Onboarding

You want to be confident that they do have experience with onboarding and a defined process.

• What does an onboarding plan look like?
• Are there dedicated resources for onboarding?
• How long does implementation take?
• What roles within the customer company are needed for the onboarding team?
• Do customers have access to web portals to track jobs and run reports?

Compliance

Compliance is part of all transactional print and mail, so you want to know the details on how they’ll keep you compliant.

• What compliance certifications do they hold?
• What is the provider’s compliance program?
• Do they have a Compliance officer and any other staff solely responsible for compliance?
• What tactics do they use to ensure checks and balances within compliance requirements?

Security

Along with compliance, security is vital in transactional communications. The provider needs to have a robust data and physical security plan.

• How does the company approach data security?
• What specific cybersecurity protocols does the provider use?
• What are the technical aspects of security (e.g., encryption)?
• How does file sharing work securely?
• Has the company ever had a cyber-attack or data breach?
• What physical security safeguards are in place?

Accuracy

Accuracy is another crucial component of transactional documents. Each page needs to fold correctly into the right envelope to prevent mismailings.

• How does the company ensure accuracy?
• Does the provider use intelligent insertion?
• What is their accuracy rating?
• How often do they audit accuracy processes to make adjustments?

Postage

The key to these questions is to understand how they are going to provide you with the best rate and the tactics they use.

• What postage optimization techniques do they use?
• How do they presort?
• Do they use a vendor partner for presorting?
• How do they guarantee the best rates?
• What is their relationship with USPS?

Quality

Be confident that your next provider prioritizes quality in printing and processes with these questions.

• Does the vendor use a quality assurance (QA) or quality control (QC) framework?
• How does the provider gauge quality?
• How often does the vendor do quality checks?
• Does the provider have a means to improve processes that led to consistent quality (e.g., standard works)?

Pricing

The last part of the RFP will be the request for pricing based on the type and quantity of your print jobs. While it’s easy to put more emphasis on the cost, you get what you pay for. The vendor with the cheapest rates may have considerable gaps that will cost you later. Be sure it’s just one aspect of your decision-making process.

Ready to Build Your Print and Mail RFP?

With these questions, you’ll be ready to capture the information you need to make an informed decision. We happily respond to RFPs with thorough answers and details. Contact us today if you’d like us to consider your RFP!

FAQs

Should companies submit a print and mail RFP?

Yes, companies should submit a print and mail RFP. It allows businesses to compare services equally. You’ll have answers to the same questions across proposals, allowing you to find the best fit based on compliance, security, accuracy, capabilities, and costs.

How many questions should a print and mail RFP contain?

An RFP for print and mail services should contain 15 to 30 core questions. They should cover all the categories discussed above: capabilities, onboarding, compliance, security, accuracy, postage, and quality.

Should pricing be your top consideration in an RFP?

Pricing will always be part of the evaluation. However, you should look at the total cost associated with services. Lower-cost providers may not have the best strategies and protocols for quality, compliance, security, and accuracy.

For businesses currently outsourcing transactional communications, have you evaluated their deliverables lately? How confident are you that they are meeting the mark in terms of compliance, accuracy, quality, and security? If you’re unsure, it may be time to change your print and mail provider.

6 Signs It’s Time to Change Your Print and Mail Provider

Whether you’ve been with your vendor for one year or 10, you should continually evaluate how well they are working for you. These are the top signs that it’s time for a change.

1. Their Accuracy Rating Is Declining

Accuracy is non-negotiable in transactional print and mail. Mis-mailings can lead to charges of non-compliance and reputational harm.

Accuracy rate is a metric you should be monitoring. While 100% accuracy isn’t possible, it should be close. Many vendors tout that they have a 99.6% accuracy rate. It sounds good, but in a mailing of 100,000, that’s still 40 mis-mailings.

Because of our dedication to accuracy, our rating is 99.9999%. So, how do we have this industry-leading rate?

First, we use Lean Manufacturing principles to audit processes constantly and make adjustments.

Second, we use intelligent mail insertion. This process prints a 2D barcode on every piece of paper. A camera scans that barcode, transferring information to the inserters about which pages go into each envelope. A second camera captures this for verification.

By leveraging technology and machinery, accuracy becomes greater. If you don’t have these kinds of rates with your current vendor, start evaluating other options.

2. They’re Weak on Compliance

All transactional mail has a compliance component because it includes sensitive and protected information. Regulations dictate the rules, and your provider must follow them precisely. Simply having certifications and compliance checks isn’t enough to keep you in good standing.

Beyond the standard certifications like HIPAA, PCI DSS, and FISMA, check to see if they have certificates for SOC I & II. These frameworks are much more rigid in terms of security protocols and demonstrate a higher commitment to compliance.

When there are regulatory changes, does your vendor seem on top of them? Are they communicating what they’re doing to remain compliant? If you’re not receiving any information about that, it could be a red flag.

Ideally, print and mail companies will have dedicated compliance personnel who are experts in transactional communications. Those that do not may be unable to keep you updated and safe from non-compliance claims.

3. They’ve Had Security Issues

You’re sending over protected data to your vendor to run jobs. Even if they only keep it for a short period of time, there’s still a chance it could be breached. Data breaches create exposure for all parties, so you need to know about their security history.

They may not have suffered a breach, but they could have other less impactful issues relating to security. They may have improperly shared it internally or not know all the places it could exist in their network.

Vetting their security protocols should be ongoing. The risk of cyber-attacks keeps growing, and hackers are becoming more sophisticated every day. Do a “security check” with your vendor, inquiring about any concerns and new defenses they are putting in place. If they can’t provide this, you have every right to be wary.

4. Changes Take Too Long

Changing your letters and documents with your vendor shouldn’t require tremendous effort. It’s something you’ll need to do regularly. Does your vendor currently have a process? Are you able to submit this online?

It should be a simple request process to make changes that you can track in real-time. While not as important as accuracy, security, and compliance, these inconveniences waste your time.

5. Your Undeliverable Mail Rates Are Going Up

Does your current vendor help with address hygiene? Address hygiene involves:

• Standardization of address formats to align with postal regulations
• Validation that addresses exist and can receive mail
• Data cleansing to correct errors
• Duplicate addresses removal
• Comparing current addresses to electronic address changes submitted to USPS and updating as needed

Without this step, you could be paying a lot of postage fees on undeliverable mail. You can reduce this by working with a company that supports address hygiene.

6. You’re Paying Extra Fees for Pre-Printing Templates

Some vendors don’t have the ability to execute dynamic printing, which enables unique content for every addressee. They may need to pre-print templates to satisfy your needs for personalized letters. That costs you time and money.

Legacy printers still struggle with this, but modern ones use a manufacturing process called the White Paper Factory. In this approach, large rolls of white paper feed into commercial inkjet printers. Every page from the job prints at the same time. Every letter can be customized, which also eliminates the need for inserts, reducing your overall costs.

Ready to Change Your Print and Mail Provider?

Do these signs sound familiar? Is your overall satisfaction falling? If so, we invite you to learn more about why we’re one of the most trusted transactional communications companies in the world. Get started by contacting our team today.

Many organizations choose to outsource transactional communications. It makes sense in terms of costs, compliance, accuracy, and quality. While there are many vendors, not all are the same. That’s why it’s vital to compare statement printing and mailing providers.

By using these criteria, you can make the best choice for your organization. As a result, you’ll feel confident that your statements arrive on time and follow all regulatory requirements.

What Is a Statement Printing Provider?

A statement printing provider describes a specialized vendors that use automation, manufacturing frameworks, and compliance expertise to print and mail documents. These communications are transactional because they contain protected information, regulated by laws.

Generally, these companies use high-speed inkjet printers, Lean Manufacturing pillars, intelligent mail insertion, and secure file processing.

How Should You Compare Statement Printing Companies?

When evaluating statement printing and mailing providers, there are some essential things you should consider. Let’s review the best way to make a fair comparison.

Compliance Without Compromise

Compliance in transactional print and mail isn’t optional. It must be at the root of every workflow and action. Most vendors will have the basics of adhering to regulations like HIPAA, FISMA, or other industry-related rules. True compliance is more than this.

First, they should have certifications in both SOC I & II. This demonstrates they have advanced control frameworks for security, processing integrity, privacy, and confidentiality regarding sensitive data.

Second, a provider should be integrating compliance into every aspect of production. Many are able to do this at scale with Lean Manufacturing, which audits workflows to find and address issues immediately.

Third, the company should have dedicated compliance staff. Ideally, they’ll employ a compliance officer who has a team of experts. Their sole responsibility is to ensure compliance for every statement produced.

In your RFP, ask specific questions about compliance programs, including specific processes and roles.

Security That’s Proactive

Data security must have a proactive approach to be effective. It’s the second area for scrutiny when you compare statement printing and mailing providers.

Risk is inherent with protected information, but the best providers have layers of security to protect it. There are several areas under this topic to focus on during your assessment, including:

• Encrypting data while in transit or at rest
• Providing a private cloud for any stored data
• Enabling secure file transmission
• Full disk encryption
• Network segmentation
• Multi-factor authentication
• Advanced firewalls and IPS (Intrusion Protection System)
• Regular penetration testing and vulnerability scanning

In addition to data security, also inquire about physical security. Statement production occurs in a facility, but how secure is it? Are there cameras across the building and around the perimeter? How easy is it to gain access to production areas?

Get the answers to these questions before making a decision.

Accuracy That’s Reliable

Mis-mailings of statements can happen any time. The more of these errors that occur, the higher your chance of claims for non-compliance. That’s why accuracy is so crucial.

While no print and mail company can guarantee 100% accuracy, there are proven frameworks for boosting accuracy with intelligent mail insertion.

Intelligent mail insertion involves scanning 2D barcodes printed on each piece of paper in the mailing. When scanned, the inserter receives information about what pages to fold into each envelope. Another camera captures this insertion for verification. While automated, there’s continuous monitoring of the process.

It’s critical to ask questions about how they manage insertion accuracy. Some workflows don’t have this level of detail. You can even ask to see how it works in person.

Quality Assurance vs. Quality Control

The next area of comparison is about quality. You’ll need to establish which one they adhere to: quality assurance (QA) or quality control (QC). They are different in ways that matter.

QA uses auditing of workflows to identify any deviations in the process. When revealed, operators make adjustments. QC simply looks at already produced products, so there’s no plan to fix issues or diagnose root causes.

QA facilitates continuous improvement. Include questions in your comparison criterion about how a vendor measures quality and what they use to manage and improve it.

Ready to Compare Statement Printing Companies

These four areas of comparison are the foundation for finding the right fit for your company. Pricing will also factor in, but low-cost vendors tend to cut corners, which could leave you exposed. Concentrate more on value.

Want to begin the comparison process with us? Contact us today for a no-cost consultation.

Customer statements are transactional documents, which means they include sensitive or protected information. They are also a key component of customer engagement. It’s something they actually look at, so you have a lot of real estate available to communicate with them.

Redesigning these documents can support the reduction of service calls and accelerate payments. Keep reading to learn how.

Strategies to Use in Redesigning Customer Statements

There are a variety of design best practices that can lead to improved engagement. The result of this could decrease calls to support and speed up payments. Let’s review key strategies to implement.

Address FAQs

Your customer service data can provide insights into trends on frequently asked questions. Once you identify these, consider adding a section to the statement that lists them. You can change them out monthly or at some interval to ensure you’re answering the right questions.

For example, you may detect a pattern related to how to make payments or late fees. If you put these on statements, customers are likely to read them. They have the answers, so they don’t need to call into support.

Track data related to calls and any decreases to see if they align with the FAQs you posted.

Include White Space

Even if you have valuable information on your statements, they may still be overlooked. Much of that has to do with the organization of the content. Too many elements, boxes, or copy makes them too busy.

Be strategic about how you use white space and simplify hierarchy. Put the most crucial information at the top and lay out the content by importance.

For specific messaging that’s new or time-limited, consider putting boxes around these, inserting dividers, or using a bright color.

Overall, you want plenty of white space on customer statements. It makes them much easier to read and follow. Also, keep fonts simple and readable. These are essential for well-designed customer communications.

Be Consistent

While you may change out messaging, keep the design consistent so that addressees know where to look for information. Also, your branding on statements should reflect your corporate design elements. Doing so reminds customers that this is an official communication from your organization.

Use Visuals with Care

Charts, graphs, or other imagery can break up text blocks and deliver essential information. For example, utility companies often include usage charts to show year-over-year and month-over-month changes.

Branded icons can also help draw the eye to important messaging. Including these can draw attention to different types of content.

Add QR Codes

Want to improve payment rates and reduce days outstanding? Consider adding QR codes to the statement. Customers can scan these immediately and go to a dedicated landing page to make a payment.

You can measure the effectiveness of these by tracking clicks and payment submissions. It’s a simple way to add an option for remittance.

Present Offers to Speed Up Payments

Another design component to consider is highlighting offers. These can be wide-ranging. You may do this now to promote cross-sells and upsells. They could also showcase a program for automatic payments with an incentive.

If customers sign up for automatic payments, you might incentivize them with a discount. Putting this directly on the statement gives it more prominence than email campaigns or inserts.

PCI Group Empowers Easy Customer Statement Redesign

Our customers have access to redesign requests. Our system makes this simple and easy. We also use dynamic printing frameworks, which means you can customize the content for each individual statement. This makes it easy to target addressees.

It’s one more reason why companies trust us to manage their transactional print and mail operations. Find out how it works and why we’re a leader in the industry by contacting us today.

In an instant, your operations could face interruptions. From cyber attacks to weather disasters to technology downtime, having a disaster recovery plan for print and mail is imperative.

While you may have one in place, how confident are you that it’s the best? Ask yourself, if my operation were to be disabled for any period of time, how long would it take to get the mail out? There could be gaps in the workflow and high costs associated with cold sites. So how do you determine if your program is cost-effective, efficient, and compliant?

What Is a Disaster Recovery Plan for Print and Mail?

A disaster recovery plan for print and mail involves a set of processes to ensure business continuity of your transactional communication operations. Typically, you would engage a third party to handle this, but not all programs are the same.

It’s crucial to understand these differences so you can make the best decisions for your business.

Cold Site vs. Hot Site Disaster Recovery

There are two main options for disaster recovery—cold sites and hot sites. Cold sites have many drawbacks that make them questionable for delivering true continuity of operations. They have been the traditional option, but hot sites are gaining popularity.

Cold sites operate as they sound. The site is “cold,” meaning it’s not on-demand and ready to go. A cold site must be activated.

This approach has many gaps. They usually only cover disaster scenarios. There is no standard process in place to make this handoff, and the provider has to “learn” your workflows and requirements.

There’s also an annual fee to participate, along with subscription and declaration costs. Delays are normal as well since production has to ramp up, which means you could experience delays with compliance consequences.

Hot sites are the opposite. They are on demand, as the provider runs a portion of your jobs every month. They understand how your system works and can immediately begin production. They can even produce a different type of letter or statement each month to ensure they know how to print and mail all your communications.

Hot Sites with ACTIV dR

Our ACTIV dR program operates as a hot site. You also won’t pay annual, subscription, or declaration fees. The monthly payment is simply the cost to run that part of your mailings.

ACTIV dR covers planned and unplanned disruptions, including high-demand periods (e.g., end of year or tax time), labor shortages, or equipment failures.

We also maintain two truly redundant sites so production can begin at either. We ascribe to Lean Manufacturing and the White Paper Factory, which support efficiency and reduce costs. Lean Manufacturing ensures there are specific workflows, which we audit continuously to improve.

The White Paper Factory is a framework that maximizes materials. Operators feed large rolls of white paper into commercial inkjet printers so every page prints at the same time. It eliminates the need for pre-printing templates, inserts, and change-outs.

The Best Disaster Recovery Plan for Print and Mail is ACTIV dR

Don’t let an interruption to production derail your transactional print and mail jobs. By partnering with us and our hot sites, you can be confident you’re not jeopardizing business continuity or compliance.

Connect with our experts today to explore ACTIV dR.

Undeliverable mail is often a hidden cost that raises your overall expenses. It also impacts the deliverability of mission-critical communications. Both of these problems affect your print and mail operations.

So, what are these costs, and how can you reduce them?

The Real Costs of Undeliverable Mail

According to Pitney Bowes, the cost of returned mail can range from $3 to $25 per piece. These expenses can quickly become a significant issue.

Here’s a breakdown of what leads to these costs:

• Sunk production costs: Paper, ink, toner, and original postage
• Second mailing: Updating addresses and resending
• Database updates: Any technology costs associated with revising addresses
• Operational bottlenecks and manual workflows: Increases in labor costs
• Lost revenue: Delaying statements means slower payments
• Compliance penalties: High return rates could disqualify your mailings from automation

Avoiding all this is possible with address hygiene tools.

Reducing Undeliverable Mail with Address Hygiene Tools

Address hygiene involves using technology and processes to verify addresses. It typically includes these elements:

• Standardization of the format of addresses to align with postal regulations
• Validation that the address exists and can receive mail
• Cleansing data to fix errors
• Duplicate address removal
• Comparing current addresses to electronic address changes submitted to USPS and updating as necessary

These capabilities operationalize address verification to be part of the workflow. It occurs before any document prints. Creating such an infrastructure requires deep investment and expertise. It’s not something you can scale unless you are a professional print and mail company.

Top Benefits of Address Hygiene

Undeliverable mail is a burden. You’ll realize these advantages by working with a third-party solely dedicated to transactional print and mail.

Reduce your postage costs: The system rejects undeliverable addresses, so there’s no waste.

Ensure compliance: The service provided by professionals always aligns with regulatory requirements.

Improve accuracy: You’ll receive address updates to your files, ensuring more precision in your mailings.

How Address Hygiene Works

In our solution, PCI Scrub, we created a tool to address undeliverable mail. The program automatically identifies and intercepts any incomplete or inaccurate addresses. It combines proprietary technology with the USPS Intelligent Mail® Barcode (IMb) and other databases, including:

• NCOALink: The USPS maintains the NCOA (National Change of Address), which represents all permanent change-of-address records submitted within the past 48 months. It updates weekly.
• Address Element Correction (AEC): The USPS created this quality process to increase the accuracy of addressed mail. It uses computer logic to correct common misspellings or other errors.
• Pixie: We developed this database for address scrubbing. It has known bad addresses from a large client pool. Pixie eliminates bad addresses prior to printing.

When the platform finds an updated address, it updates immediately. With this in place, you can significantly lower the hard and soft costs of undeliverable mail.

Don’t Let Undeliverable Mail Raise Your Costs

By combining technology and data sets, you can quickly find and address bad addresses. As a result, you won’t have to pay postage twice, and you won’t waste materials. Address hygiene is just one of the unique capabilities we offer.

Learn about it and more by contacting our experts today.

The USPS regularly raises rates. For any company mailing statements, documents, or any other transactional communication, it’s challenging to decrease these expenses. The USPS postage price will continue to increase, but you have options on how to combat it.

The July 2026 USPS Postage Price Increases

In July, new rates will be effective. Overall, the increase is an average of 4.8% and includes the following:

• Forever Stamps: $0.78 to $0.82
• Metered 1-oz letters: $0.74 to $0.78.
• Domestic postcards: $0.61 to $0.65.
• Certified Mail fee: $5.30 to $5.55
• International 1-oz letters: $1.70 to $1.75

While these rates have a nominal increase, it adds up, especially if you aren’t using postage optimization strategies.

What Are Postage Optimization Strategies?

Postage optimization strategies describe a set of tactics that transactional print and mail companies use to secure the best rates. It’s a multi-pronged approach that involves presorting, standardization, undeliverable mail reduction, and commingling.

Postage Optimization Tactics

Let’s review best practices to combat USPS postage price increases.

Presorting

Presorting is the central foundation of postage optimization.  You may be currently using it, but likely not to the extent of commercial print and mail houses. The key is to group mailings by ZIP codes. USPS “rewards” customers who do this with better rates because it’s less work for them.

As a manual process, it’s overwhelming. For it to be very effective in reducing costs, you also need massive volume. Any internal process you may currently have cannot compete with using a third-party presorting service.

When applied correctly, you can ensure the best discounts. Since all letters are already sealed, you also meet any compliance requirements.

Standardization

Are your mailings all the same size? If not, you’ll have variable rate costs. Ideally, you want everything to fit in a #10 envelopes and weigh 3.5 oz or less. A big factor in this is paper weight.

Transactional print and mail companies are experts at this. Plus, you won’t need inserts anymore. Dynamic printing on each statement or letter is available to deliver any key messaging you would have included.

Undeliverable Mail

The costs of undeliverable mail are increasing your postage costs. Your customer files may not have the most up-to-date addresses and may have a high number of duplicates. These expenses are manageable with the right approach.

Address hygiene tools solve this problem. It uses technology and the USPS Intelligent Mail® (IMb) barcode. The solution scans your database and corrects bad addresses while deleting duplicates.

It’s an easy and effective way to reduce waste in the mailing process. Plus, you can be confident that customers are receiving communications.

Commingling

In addition to presorting, commingling further segments your mailings by ZIP code. It combines mails into a massive mail stream. This consolidation qualifies the letters for the deepest bulk rate discounts. As a plus, faster delivery is often an outcome.

Beyond these postage optimization options, you should also consider electronic delivery.

USPS Mailing Promotions

USPS has been offering postage rate discounts for incorporating integrated technologies and tactile mailing options in your mail.  Working with a progressive commercial mailer will enable you to take advantage of these discounts to reduce postage costs

Emailing Transactional Communications

Many of your customers may already be paperless. Some part of your audience will always prefer a mailed document, but you can convert others by promoting the convenience and security of email.

There are many benefits to emailing transactional communications. It will reduce your overall postage costs, but there’s much more.

You’ll need a compliant email solution to manage this in line with regulations and security. When considering options, look for these benefits:

• Sender certification: This feature analyzes deliverability issues to ensure your emails always hit customers’ inboxes.
• Reputation monitoring: This functionality allows you to track signals impacting your sender reputation. You can then address these.
• List validation: You can decrease bounces from incorrect emails with this tool to determine if they are dead, wrong, or dangerous.
• Inbox placement: You can measure performance with these insights and prevent emails from going into spam folders.
• Email authentication: This capability monitors email authentication protocols, improving your reputation and deliverability.

Optimize Postage and Consider Complaint Emails to Reduce the Impact of USPS Price Increases

With all these strategies, you can abate the rate hikes coming in July. By outsourcing with professionals like PCI Group, you can lock in the most favorable rates and expand your email recipients with one partner.

Learn more about working with us today with a no-cost consultation.

Disasters happen every day, and they have the potential to derail production and operations. If you face downtime due to inclement weather, a cyber attack, or any other disruption, you must activate your business continuity plan. What it might not contain is how to print and mail regulated customer communications. You can address this with disaster recovery print services.

What Are Disaster Recovery Print Services?

Disaster recovery print services describe business continuity solutions to ensure transactional communications continue to be produced. You’ll contract with a company to assume your processes should you be unable to do so.

There are multiple structures for these offerings. Understanding the limitations and scope helps you make the best decisions.

How Do Disaster Recovery Print Solutions Strengthen Business Continuity?

The objective of business continuity is to keep it running, despite disasters, disruptions, or downtime. Companies have to look across all their operations and define policies for each to achieve continuity.

They may look to many organizations for support with this. Finding specialized services like disaster recovery printing can be cumbersome. Also, most vendors in the space don’t look at this with a modern lens.

They still cling to obsolete models with “cold” backups. In these situations, you’re simply renting capacity from a vendor who isn’t familiar with your work. If this is your only option, you may have a huge gap in continuity for these tasks.

That’s been the standard for decades, but a new option is emerging that’s more comprehensive. In this framework, your provider isn’t your backup. They know your jobs because they produce a fraction of them regularly. You request they take over, and it’s nearly immediate and available 24-7.

What Are the Different Types of Disaster Recovery Print Services?

You can group these into two main categories: traditional and comprehensive. Here’s how they differ:

• Annual fees: Traditional requires them; comprehensive does not.
• Subscription costs: Traditional charges them; comprehensive does not.
• What’s covered: Traditional is only there in disaster scenarios. Comprehensive usually provides coverage for planned and unplanned downtime. It may also be a supplement when there are peak demands or labor shortages.
• Rates: Traditional disaster recovery approaches include costs for production, materials, click fees, and other expenses. The more modern option has competitive rates that are inclusive.
• Manufacturing environments: Most traditional providers have more than one facility, but they usually are not redundant and may not have consistency across operations. The comprehensive package has true redundancy and uniformity.

What’s the Difference Between Cold Sites and Working with a Provider Regularly?

In many disaster recovery offerings, your work goes to a cold site. It’s “cold” because there’s no instant handoff. The print and mail company doesn’t have a structure in place to understand your workflows and requirements.

Since they are starting from scratch, there can be delays as well as concerns about compliance, accuracy, and quality. Errors may increase, or you could fall behind on meeting dates.

The alternative is to allow your disaster recovery services partner to produce a portion of your communications monthly. That work can rotate across all the different letters you send, so they have knowledge around each one. They then know your processes and preferences. Should a disaster occur, they can immediately begin production.

These two frameworks present different outcomes. With cold sites, you face considerable risks. Whereas printers that know your business and needs can take over without missing a beat.

ACTIV dR: Comprehensive Disaster Recovery Print

PCI Group created ACTIV dR to rewrite disaster recovery print services. All the attributes described in the comparison earlier represent ACTIV dR solutions. When working with us, you’re protected from any disasters and can transition production to us immediately.

Want to learn more? Request a consultation with our team.

Transactional communications tie directly to regulatory requirements. Because they contain personally identifiable information (PII) and/or protected health information (PHI), they have special rules. However, experienced providers deliver print-to-mail solutions that satisfy compliance and offer many advantages.

What Are Print-to-Mail Solutions for Transactional Communications?

First, let’s define transactional communications. They contain PHI, PII, or other sensitive information. This means they are subject to compliance, security, and accuracy protocols. It’s a unique subset of customer communications that requires robust processes and policies.

Print to mail solutions for transactional describes outsourcing printing and mailing of them. You simply send the data securely to your provider, and they handle everything else.

What Types of Transactional Communications Can You Outsource?

The capabilities of transactional print and mail companies are broad. There’s really nothing you can’t choose to outsource, regardless of regulations or industry. Common communications include:

• Statements, invoices, and billing documents
• Anything related to insurance policies
• Explanations of benefits or coverage
• Collection letters
• Approvals and denials of claims
• Regulatory or privacy mailings
• Checks
• Tax forms

If the content includes sensitive data going to a customer, you can employ a provider to produce and distribute it.

What Do Print-to-Mail Solutions Include?

The services that transactional print and companies offer can vary. In most cases, they include:

• Receiving data from you via a secure file processing system
• Generating the letters and providing a sample for review
• Data scrubbing to remove duplicate and bad addresses
• Composition for printing
• High-volume inkjet printing
• Mail preparation
• Presorting jobs for the best postage rates
• Tracking of communications throughout the mail stream
• Special mailing services (e.g., USPS Certified Mail)
• Access to reporting and analytics

Each of these is vital to compliance, accuracy, and security. If there are limitations by a provider, you may not receive what you expect. That’s why you should evaluate providers and ask lots of questions about their capabilities and protocols.

What Are the Most Important Questions When Reviewing Print-to-Mail Providers?

When you compare providers, you’ll uncover a lot about how they work and what they offer by asking these questions.

• What compliance certifications do they hold?
• How do they integrate compliance into workflows?
• What data security policies and provisions do they have in place?
• Do they have true redundancy for operations?
• What cybersecurity best practices do they follow?
• How do they measure and improve accuracy?
• Do they audit processes regularly?
• What practices do they follow to insure quality?
• What frameworks or strategies do they use to produce transactional communications?
• How do they optimize postage rates?
• Do they have experience with helping companies transition to outsourcing?
• Can they share a plan for migration?

Are Print-to-Mail Solutions Right for You?

For organizations struggling with rising costs as well as security and compliance complexity, outsourcing addresses these. You’ll no longer have capital expenses; only operational ones. You can see a dramatic decrease in these expenditures.

Since companies like PCI Group only operate in the transactional space, they have all the expertise for ensuring compliance and security.

Get started by having a conversation with our team.