If your business is sending any volume amount of mail, it is common that return to senders become a large problem so we decided to create this free resource in order to help you to find out ways to reduce these annoying return to senders and to save your business money at the same time
Why do you get Return To Sender Mail?
Many businesses maintain large customer and prospect databases and invariably over time the integrity of these databases become degraded as their customers move and the system is not upgraded. Now this issue is very difficult to solve and the solution will depend on your business and processes unique to you.
However the second cause of return to senders is caused by information being incorrectly added to your database in the first instance. A good example of this is forgetting to put a unit number at the front of a street address or when a customer provides what is known as a “vanity” suburb whereby stating that they live in one suburb but their postal address is in another.
How do I avoid bad data being entered into my database?
Each quarter the Post Office releases what is known as the Postal Address File or PAF which is a database of every deliverable address within Australia and the correct address format in order to ensure that the mail gets to that definition. Now this database can never be 100% accurate as it cannot allow for the knowledge of local posties which may allow mail to be delivered even if the address is not completely accurate but it is pretty close.
There are several software providers available out there that created applications that integrate with the PAF to ensure that your business has clean mailing address information at two key points:
How do I ensure the addresses are correct when I enter them into my database?
Some of the third party software developers have integrated the PAF with CRM and other database management tools in a way that your staff members are forced into marrying the address they enter into your systems as true against the PAF.
This is usually done in a reverse fashion starting with the postcode then the street and then the number. By doing it in this fashion it also has the additional benefit of making it faster for your staff to collect addresses by progressively narrowing down their selection options.
How do I ensure that my addresses are correct before sending out mail?
In most instances, prior to sending any bulk mailing, the first step is of the process is to export data from your systems ready to be merged into your document. Some third party developers have created add-ons in applications such as excel to batch process addresses and correct them automatically just prior to you printing your documents and sending your mail out.
So there you have it, a couple of key tips in order to drastically reduce the amount of return to senders that your business receives and when you calculate out the actual cost of return to senders to your business depending on the amount that you receive, this can actually add up to quiet a lot.
Feel free to give us a call on 1300 624 562 or click here to email us for a no obligation chat about anything mail related.
