FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 9, 2001
Press Release #01-002

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Postal Service stepped up construction of its Information Platform today by obtaining funding approval from the Board of Governors to invest in computer technology that will provide real-time mail flow information for both large volume mailers and postal management. Large volume mailers will be able to track their mail as it flows through the automated mailstream, while allowing postal management to better match equipment and staffing to workloads, improving productivity and reducing operating costs. Approval was also obtained to invest in technologies that will replace existing accounting and employee timekeeping systems. The enhancements will provide more detailed information in near real-time while reducing the need for administrative positions.

Today's automated sorting equipment funding approval will upgrade 300 existing Integrated Data Servers (IDS), a primary source of operational and mail sorting data for the Information Platform and include purchasing 25 new systems to support emerging Postal and customer data requirements.

In making his presentation to the Board, Vice President, Information Platform Charles Bravo focused on the need to serve two primary audiences.

"The Integrated Data Systems," Bravo explained, "was deployed to three hundred processing plants and only collects data from letter mail bar code sorters at the end of each mail processing run. Our customers need mail status information on flats as well as letters. They also need this information in near-real-time rather than having to wait for the end of each processing run, a typical delay of anywhere from 30-minutes to six-hours."

Bravo said the second driver behind the expansion is postal management's need for information about the mail during processing.

"Like our customers, we need this information, and we need it in near-real-time. Our current systems cannot support these needs."

Bravo said the upgrades will collect data from all automated equipment, not just bar code sorters, but also flat and parcel sorting equipment, including material handling systems.

The IDS was originally developed and deployed in 1998 to collect bar code data for two programs. The first, Identification Code Tracking, tracks letter mail through the automated distribution system, where IDS collects information from several kinds of bar codes. One is the orange Identification Code placed on the back of letters for Remote ZIP Encoding. Similar to a license tag, the unique code identifies individual mail pieces and is applied to letter mail when high-speed sorters cannot correctly read address image information necessary to apply barcodes. In this case, the physical mailpiece bearing the orange bar code on the back remains at the mail processing center. The scanned address image is "e-mailed" off-site to a Remote Encoding Center where human operators read the scanned image, key in the correct ZIP Code information, and then "e-mail" the data back to the mail processing plant. There the correct barcode is matched to the physical envelope bearing the unique orange license tag so the mail piece can continue automated processing.

Prior to Remote Encoding Technology, unreadable mail was processed by labor-intensive hand sorting at a cost of more than $55 per thousand mailpieces. Automation, by contrast, offers a ten-fold savings at just over $5 per thousand pieces.

Retail Information Platform Initiative

Retail outlets and business mail entry units account for 60 percent or $38 billion of total Postal Service revenue. The Postal Service operates with a network of 85 district accounting offices. Yet its 15-year-old field accounting data collection and reporting system decision-making information is limited to a summary level. Moreover, several stovepipe-reporting systems further hinder management's ability to provide results at a retail unit or individual product level.

The Standard Accounting For Retail – Retail Accounting (SAFRA-RA) initiative will replace obsolete systems, manual procedures and eliminate non-value-added transactions systems when deployed by the end of fiscal year 2003.

Vice President, Finance, Controller, Donna Peak, commenting on her presentation said, "This will pass on efficiencies obtained from new web-based technologies to our accounting processes and enable the Postal Service to gain more internal controls."

With the SAFR-RA system and new accounting practices, management will have the opportunity to automate accounting functions. The initiative will replace the existing field system by implementing an industry leading retail accounting and merchandising system. Postal Service retail accounting procedures will be redesigned to conform to Commercial-Off-The-Shelf accounting systems. Standardization of processes will be accomplished.

Initiative Consolidates Five Timekeeping Systems into One

Funding was approved to implement the Time and Attendance Collection System (TACS) for purposes of replacing five existing timekeeping systems. This new single, modular system will provide management with a nationwide, near real-time view of salary and benefit information down to the individual pay location level. TACS will improve the timing and compatibility of payroll data, support other critical information technology initiatives, and offer new opportunities not currently available to front-line supervisors, field managers, and headquarters operations.