New Envelope guidelines from NZ Post
On 1 July 2008, NZ Post will require all mail that falls into the 'machine readable' and 'bulk mail' categories to comply with the standards published in Bulk Mail Guidelines for Volume Post.
This means DLE and C5 envelopes used in bulk mailouts, for which the reduced rate is desired.
Click image for enlarged view of mail pieces front details.
The main points are:
- The Permit impression must be placed with the 'Indicia' area at the top right of the envelope face. The Indicia area is 80mm wide and 40mm high. The Permit impression itself is to be 60mm wide and 14mm high.
- No graphics, logo or text at all must appear in the bottom 15mm of the envelope face. This is the Sortcode clear zone, which is where the sorting machines will write the barcodes that facilitate the mail delivery.
- The sender address (and logo) must appear only in the Sender address area at the top left of the envelope. This area is 100mm wide and 40mm high. Within the sender address, all street/suburb/city/country information is to be in one line, separated by commas. For example:
21 Smith Street, Port Chalmers, Dunedin 9001, New Zealand
not
21 Smith Street
Port Chalmers
Dunedin 9001
New Zealand
This to prevent the device that reads the delivery address on the envelope from reading the return address in error. - The address area extends across the front of the enelope, and must avoid the Sender address area, the Indicia area and the Sortcode zone. As of next year, the new NZ Postcodes are to be used. The postcode must follow the city name, separated by a space, and not be printed on the following line. For example:
47 Jones Street
Port Chalmers
Dunedin 9001
New Zealand
not
47 Jones Street
Port Chalmers
Dunedin
9001
New Zealand
In general
Any mail piece not complying with the new standards will incur a 15% surcharge. In other words, if you want your mail to go at the cheap bulk rate, make sure your envelope is correctly laid out, and your merged address information is accurate and correctly formatted.
Full details and descriptions of all of the above (plus other useful information) can be found in Bulk Mail Guidelines for Volume Post 1 and 3, available from NZ Post.