What does NCOA mean?

Simply stated, NCOA (National Change of Address) is a database maintained by the United States Postal Service and is used to provide accurate and up to date addresses for businesses, individuals and families. When a business, family or individual moves they have the option of filing out the “Change of Address” form at the United States Post Office. This information is then stored and constantly updated to monitor and insure that all mail has an optimal chance of being deliverable. This software program is also available through licensed non-exclusive third party service providers and also made available to mail houses. By ‘scrubbing’ your mailing list through the NCOA software, addressing errors are identified and corrected before your mail enters the mail stream.

Why is it so important to ‘scrub’ my mailing list through the NCOA software?

The average homeowner, for example, moves or relocates approximately every seven years. It’s estimated that nearly 40 million American’s move their place of residence and/or businesses every year! In addition, businesses not only change locations as they expand, or downsize, but also frequently dissolve. The failure to run an NCOA scrub on your mailing list/data file can result in an undeliverable mail rate of up to 20%! That’s right, 20% of your mailing list might wind up being returned to you as ‘undeliverable.’ This translates into 20% of your postage dollars being wasted on undeliverable mail. Also, recently, the United States Postal Service has started to require that NCOA processing and cleanup be performed on certain types of mailings.

Does A⁺ Letter Service offer NCOA list ‘scrubbing’?

Yes, upon request, A⁺ Letter Service will provide you with NCOA list ‘scrubbing’ services for a nominal fee. When compared to expense of the wasted postage dollars spent for undeliverable mail by not ‘scrubbing’ your mailing list/data file, the savings vs. the expense of performing an NCOA scrub are substantial. Additionally valuable customers and prospects names that would have been undeliverable will be updated to receive current and future mailings. This translates into more opportunities, more sales and more revenue.

Can NCOA list processing save me money on postage?

Yes, in many cases in order to obtain presort or automation rates for First Class mail or Standard Mail service, mailers must provide proof that they have updated the addresses in the mailing list within a specific timeframe prior to the mailing date. When you consider that in many instances the most costly part of a mailing is the postage; presorted postal savings can be substantial and result in increased profitability when conducting your direct mail campaign.