The postal service sorts and delivers more than 700 million pieces of mail each delivery day. but how does each piece get from point a to point b? follow the fast and furious journeys of a courier…
enclose your mail in its envelope and complete the address. once that letter has been deposited in a collection box, a letter carrier removes all the mail from the box and takes it to the neighborhood post office. From there, that letter, along with other mail collected by other carriers from that post office, is gathered in the mail room and put on a truck and delivered to a mail processing plant.
At the processing plant, the letter is sent through a machine that rapidly sorts the mail by form, separating the letters from large envelopes and packages, a so-called selective sorting operation. the machine adjusts the letters so that all directions are oriented the same way and right side up. then a postmark is applied with the date and the place where the letter was classified. postmark cancellation lines are also applied so that the stamp cannot be reused, in order to protect postal revenue.
Each letter is also identified by a code consisting of a series of fluorescent bars printed on the back. an optical character reader scans the address on the face of each letter. images of letters that could not be successfully read are transmitted to a remote encoding center for further processing. then all letters are placed in trays and moved to the next automated equipment for barcode application.
Linked to the identification code, a barcode is sprayed on the face of the letter. the barcode, which represents the specific delivery address, consists of tall and short bars that are used for further sorting. the barcode sends a specific correspondence to a container in the machine for a particular range of postal codes, which identify the next processing plant.
A tray, containing the mail specified for a particular zip code range, is brought to the airport to begin its flight across the country. once the plane lands at its destination, postal workers deliver the tray and its contents to the mail processing plant that serves the post office, station, or branch that will deliver the letter.
At the plant, the mailpieces in the tray are fed through a barcode sorter, which separates letters in a specific zip code from other letters in that range of zip codes. after this, the card receives its final classification. A delivery barcode sorter sorts the letter to a particular carrier who will deliver it. the barcode sorter also sorts the letters from that carrier in the order of delivery.
Then all mail from this carrier is trucked to the post office, station, or branch where the carrier works. the carrier loads trays of mail, including the letter, into a motor vehicle. Once the vehicle is loaded, the freighter heads to the street where the letter is going to be delivered and loads the mail to be delivered to each home or business in its bag. Within minutes of leaving the truck, the carrier delivers the letter to the recipient.
As letters account for the largest amount of mail volume, the postal service has continued to introduce new equipment and technology to speed letter processing. Along with letters, it also began the automation of catalogs, magazines, and other large envelopes. it has also turned its attention to speeding up packet processing. its latest focus is to provide customers with more information about each mailpiece as it travels through the system. the goal is to have an intelligent mail system by 2009, which would operate as a global positioning system for mail, using a standardized barcode on each piece of mail and mail container, allowing customers to see where their mail is in every step of the process. path.
either ee. uu. post office or a corporate mail room, the key to smooth mail delivery is organization. the United States. The postal service is a strong example of innovation and organization in the post room with the use of the right equipment. Regardless of the volume of mail you’re processing, it’s important to have the right tools to handle letters and packages. For example, mailrooms should be stocked with multiple pairs of safe and reliable box cutters. It goes without saying that any mail room or shipping and receiving department should have many types of safety knives on hand.