In-County Newspapers Entered At Delivery Offices Avoid 78% Piece Price Increase For 'Flimsy' Newspapers

National Newspaper Association received news this week that its campaign to help community newspapers avoid a postage up-charge intended for lightweight publications was successful and a 78% in-county piece rate increase that would have taken effect in June has been averted. The Postal Service announced that it would not assess a charge on carrier-routed newspapers entered at delivery offices. The charge may still apply to outside-county carrier-routed newspapers that fail a "droop" test.

The test applies to flat mail that droops more than 4 inches when extended 5 inches off a flat surface.

NNA President Cheryl Kaechele, publisher of the Allegan County (MI) News) said the charge was proposed last fall, and that NNA's Postal Committee Chairman Max Heath had immediately swung into action to prevent it. The "droop" test is imposed to charge flats that are too lightweight to be handled by automated sorting machinery, but in the latest iteration, USPS had said it thought that even publications not sorted by machine should be assessed the charge.

"We were greatly concerned," Kaechele said, "The Postal Service had announced that there would be no postage increases during this very challenging economy. Then to suddenly find this daunting charge looming because of a mere rules change was very bad news indeed. We congratulate the Postal Committee and Max Heath for effective advocacy to turn back this threat to our industry."

Heath said: "NNA won a decisive victory in its effort to ensure that so-called 'flimsy flats' entered at DDU post offices retain the Basic carrier-route price for 6-124 Periodical pieces or 10-124 Standard Mail Enhanced Carrier route pieces on a route if they fail a so-called 'deflection' test.

"NNA was the only association publicly cited during a presentation on the final rule at the Mailers Technical Advisory Committee in Washington February 17 for the reasonableness and quality of arguments to a Federal Register filing. NNA, several members, and some state associations filed comments showing that newspapers would be discriminated against with a 78% increase to 5-digit Periodical rates should a newspaper fail a new, more restrictive 'droop test.'" This revised test applies to "flat mail" that droops more than 4 vertical inches when extended 5 inches off a flat surface.

The final rule, effective June 7, indicates that the test will be applied to periodicals, such as magazines, that don't enter at Destination Delivery Units.

Heath said, "I encourage publishers to maximize their DDU drops if at all possible to avoid this nasty penalty if they have a concern that their newspaper could fail the droop test."

"This decision once again shows the value of mailers dropping their own subscriber copies via Exceptional Dispatch to DDU post offices, both in-county and across county lines, anywhere substantial carrier-route mail exists," Heath said. "Likewise, those with Standard Mail shoppers get the same price discount on Basic price carrier route sorted mail entered at the DDU. High-density and Saturation mail is already exempt from this penalty in both classes."

Each NNA member newspaper without high page counts will enjoy a savings of 4.6 cents per piece when sorted to the Basic carrier-route price In-county (line A13 of Form 3541), and 12.3 cents on every Basic carrier-route price piece Outside County (line C25 of 3541). DDU-entered shopper copies would have a savings of 11.4 cents per piece from Basic-price pieces staying on line I12 rather than going to line E9 for 5-digit rates on a 3602-R.

Members can annualize their savings by multiplying $0.046 times in-county Basic carrier route copies times the number of issues in a year, then $0.123 times outside-county Basic carrier route copies times annual issues. For newspapers with shoppers, or free Standard Mail newspapers, paying Basic carrier-route rate, multiply $0.114 times line I12 copies times the number of issues in a year. That should more than pay for annual dues for any member and multiple years membership for some.

Details of the deflection test, which is still being argued by major mailers, will appear in Max Heath's Pub Aux Postal Tips column prior to implementation.