PAVE Certification

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PAVE Certification

PAVE (Presort Accuracy Verification and Evaluation) is a voluntary program in which the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) tests presort software to determine its accuracy in sorting address information and in producing standardized supporting documentation. When the USPS refers to PAVE-certified software or PAVE-certification, it is referring to software that has been tested to verify its ability to sort addresses to USPS specifications.

Presorting is the process of arranging your mail so pieces going to the same area are bundled together. This minimizes the number of steps the USPS needs to perform on a mailing and allows them to process the mail more quickly and less expensively. The savings are then passed on to you in the form of lower postage rates and faster delivery. (In essence, you are doing some of the work for the post office and they are rewarding you for it.) In general, the more levels of sorting you perform on a mailing, the lower the cost of the postage.

An address list must be sorted by a variety of criteria, depending on the type of mail being sent (e.g., letters or flats), the mail class (First-Class, Standard, Periodicals) and on the location of each address. As one example, the Postal Service uses what is called a Sectional Center Facility (SCF) that serves as a sorting center for groups of ZIP codes. Manual sorting of mail can be complicated, because mail going to ZIP codes serviced by different SCFs must be sorted into separate, unique mail trays. ZIP codes numerically "next to one another" may actually be sent to different USPS sorting centers and should be sorted into separate trays. For instance, you might have a mailpiece with the ZIP code 94299 and one with the ZIP code 94301. If you sorted your address list into ZIP code order, you would put these mailpieces next to each other in the same sorting container. However, these ZIP codes are serviced by different SCFs. The mailpiece going to the 94299 address is sent to the 942 SCF, located in Sacramento, CA. The mailpiece going to the 94301 address is sorted at the 943 SCF, located in San Francisco, CA – seventy miles away. Thus, presort regulations require that those mailpieces be sorted into different containers before being submitted to the USPS.

Because of the complex and labor-intensive nature of manual presorting, many companies offer software that presorts your address list for you, making the mailing more cost-effective. Different software performs different presorts, so it is important that you research to ensure that the software you are purchasing sorts for the type of mailings that you do. Click here for a list of the PAVE-certified presorts that Envelope Manager's software performs.

Before you begin a presort mailing, make sure:

The software sorts for the type of mailing you want to do – First-Class or Standard Mail, postcards, flats, letters, Carrier Route, etc. Each presort class is unique in sort order, price and documentation.

The software prints the USPS-required forms. There are many different versions of the presort form – which form you need to submit depends on the presort being performed. In general, the software should print the 3600x and 3602x forms. These forms give the USPS a breakdown of the cost for the mailing, as well as mailer information (permit number, mailing address, phone number, etc.). In addition, Form 3553 is required to verify the CASS certification of any automation mailing.

The software prints the Tray and/or Sack labels (also called Container labels). These tags use a standard Universal Product Code (UPC) barcode and determine the destination of each mail tray or sack. Your post office can provide you with the trays and sacks you will need.

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