Mail Services

Business Reply Mail

We are involved with a post office program called the "Business Reply Mail Accounting System" (BRMAS). This program regulates and sets readability standards for the use of pre-barcoded business reply mail (BRM). We are involved in this program for two reasons:

  1. Pre-barcoded business reply mail on the BRMAS program is more efficient than business reply mail.
  2. BRMAS program mail costs seven cents less per piece than regular business reply mail.

The problem we have had is that the BRM we produce and send does not always qualify for BRMAS. When postal authorities detect this non-complying BRM, they take Reed off the BRMAS program until the offending mail has passed through the system. You can help alleviate this problem by making sure that your printed business reply mail is acceptable for BRMAS. Print six sample cards or letters on the paper you will use and send them to the mailroom three weeks prior to printing. We will take the samples to the mailing requirements office for certification. After corrections have been made and we have the mail piece approved by the U.S. Post Office, you can go ahead with printing.

If you are having business reply mail prepared by an outside business, it is important that they get BRMAS certification for each piece they design for you and that they send you a copy of that certification for your files. They need to do this even if they are using one of your designs that has been used successfully before. We only have to do this once per mail piece; after a piece is approved for BRMAS it can be reprinted at will as long as the address layout is not changed.

It is now possible to have international business reply cards made up by printing services.



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