PRC approves USPS’s Standard Mail Pricing Initiative (Summer Sale)

The Postal Regulatory Commission has approved the U.S. Postal Service’s plan to conduct a Standard Mail Pricing Initiative (also known as the “Summer Sale”) this summer. This is a followup to last summer’s inaugural program.
Here’s what the program looks like:

• Incentive period: July 1 to Sept. 30, 2010.
• Products: All Standard Mail letters and flats. 
• Control months: June and October. 
• Rebate amount: 30% off applicable rate above baseline. 
• Baseline: Same Period Last Year (SPLY) + 5% (i.e. 105% of what you actually mailed in the July to Sept. 2009 period) 
• Control: Downward adjustment if June or October volume is below baseline (prevents shifting of volume into incentive period) 
• Qualification: Customers must have mailed more than 350,000 Standard Mail pieces in the baseline period of July 1 to Sept. 30, 2009. This covers about 3,525 customers, or 67% of Standard Mailers.

Mail service providers (the printers and preparers that physically execute mail and give it to the USPS) are not eligible to aggregate volume on behalf of their customers.