The UPU today made its official call for tenders for the setup of the .post Registry services and .post Escrow services. Details on both tenders can be found on the UPU website (www.upu.int) under “Resources” -> “Call for Tenders” or at this link http://www.upu.int/en/resources/calls-for-tenders/current-calls-for-tenders.html.

This will also be published this week at www.simap.ch – The Swiss official gazette of commerce for official information and legal announcements.

 The last date for submissions of offers is 3 February 2012.

This is a very, very major step forward in the development of this top-level domain for the global postal industry. It will enable many posts to leap-frog forward in terms of both domestic and international services.

It is unfortunate that the USPS has thus far shown very little senior-level interest in participating in the network. The USPS still has not turned its attention to the digital challenge in the domestic service, let along contemplate cross-border services. However, we are heartened that it has at least been represented on the work committee by the very able Janice Gould of the International Department and is aware of this important project. This committee has had an intense several years of discussions, many held by telephone conference call with participants, including Janice, calling in at some times very early hours!

We would pose the question whether it might not be beneficial from a business development point of view for the USPS to use participation in providing some digital-based services through dot Post as an experiment. If they work, then bring them into the home market. How about an international hybrid mail system, for example? With world-class security within the dot Post domain, hybrid mail vendors abroad could use their posts as points of entry to the UPU system with dot Post as the transmission medium. The USPS could channel transmissions to private sector hybrid mail vendors in the US at locations closest to the postal intake points.

What’s missing in this scenario is for the terminal dues system to account for digital mail. It is unlikely posts would be interested in diverting paper mail to this channel unless they retain that income stream. There is a UPU regulation on the matter which could at least permit a start of the system. Basically, it was a compromise “punt” of the issue in a previous Congress when delegates did not know what to do with a proposal to bring hybrid mail into the terminal dues system. The problem is that it calls for countries to set the rates on a bilateral basis. Of course, if only a handful of countries are interested, perhaps this is not an overwhelming issue.

If you are not going to Triangle’s annual gathering of the most important people in the international postal industry in the Americas, you will be able to read all about it in a future issue of The Prescott Report.  However, you would be better served by attending the conference. As talented and thorough as we are in reporting on the presentations by the most important and influential people in the industry, nothing beats being there. And this year “there” is the beautiful Trump International Beach Resort in Miami. February 6 and 7, but come on the 5^th to be at the opening reception.

The program is a who’s who of important speakers and doers in the industry: Paul Vogel and Giselle Valera of the USPS; Wagner Pinheiro de Oliveira, Brazil Post; Beat Friedli, SwissSign. I will be especially interested in interplay between and among Pablo Moreno, CEO of ampm (Mexico), Alfredo Romera, president of ALACOPP, and Pablo Salvador Reyes Pruneda, DG of Mexico Post. Also speaking is Serrana Bassini, Secretary General of UPAEP and candidate for Director General of the Universal Postal Union. But there are many more good thinkers, including the writer who will suggest to the posts what they can do along the lines of Getting the Basics Right.

For the program and full details: http://www.triangle.eu.com/events/world-mail-express-americas-2012/

And who knows – we might see the renowned Donald Trump, always a potential candidate for President of the United States. This being an election year, I suspect he is travelling among his many properties shaking all the hands he can!

We’ve had a large number of requests for our article on how to find where your customers are coming from if your only contact is an inbound email.  This article is extracted from The Prescott Report Volume III Issue 4. (Available for purchase) We would caution that  in some countries emails bounce around like pinballs and the accuracy of this solution is at least “subject to confirmation”. We had one correspondent whom we located by this technique in northern India when he was in fact at the very southern tip of India.  One expert we have spoken to about this suggested that our correspondent was on a dial-up connection that linked to a server facility in the north. In fact, the address you get is that of a server, not the person. Where in the world did this come from? (107)

This may be a critical matter for legal compliance, especially with respect to privacy laws. For example, Canada’s do-not-spam law (discussed in the same issue of the newsletter as this subject) has particularly nasty penalties.  Other traps are US laws regarding doing business with people in certain countries, such as North Korea and Iran.  These have nasty penalties possibly surpassing Canada’s.

The title of the piece that caught my eye last week is “Rural Post Office closures will hurt Natives, elderly and the poor.” by Winona LaDuke in The Circle – Native American News and Arts. This is a Minneapolis-based newspaper serving the Native American population.

The author points out that a number of post offices in remote areas of Minnesota are scheduled for closure. The author gets the reason wrong – citing “federal budget cuts”, but she puts forth reasons for keeping these rural post offices open that go deep into a subject that seems absent from the discussion in Washington: “One might ask…if the USPS is a business or a service in this country, and question the long term costs of the closure.”

Is the USPS still tasked with “binding the nation together”? Certainly from Ms.LaDuke’s experience and reporting, in the Native American community there is a very pressing need for it to do just that. Unfortunately, the costs of discontinuing critical postal delivery services will be severe, and only partially “measurable”. And if it can’t be measured, Congress doesn’t want to hear about it.

Some of the consequences:

• a loss of 4,000 jobs, not a small matter in a community with few businesses or opportunities.
• the Internet is not a common tool among Native Americans, at only about 10% penetration (rural population, scattered, and poor – not a business opportunity); they need the mail.
• a higher proportion of people without drivers’ licenses or vehicles – they can’t drive 10 miles to another town for their mail.
• a highly mobile employed population which migrates between cities and the reservation, and need a permanent postal address for both legal and employment purposes.
• Address system maintenance for voting privileges, communication with government agencies, including social services and the justice system.

Let’s be clear. We are talking about a very poor community that needs the USPS as no other community does: “ Let’s start with the paperwork of being poor. Simply stated, it is a lot of work or “white paper” to be poor in this country. Just attempting to get a job, and making sure one is able to respond to prospective employers, requires a valid postal address. Voting requires a valid postal address, and people need to correspond with agencies, whether social services, justice department or energy assistance. Losing those post offices will be a burden to people who have no other way then the postal service to conduct their business. People cannot drive elsewhere for mail, and more mail will not be delivered.” 

It should be easy for Congress to declare that the taxpayers should support the USPS in situations such as these. The social good to be derived is all too clear. And if it amounts to even $1 billion a year I would be astounded. After all, as Ms. LaDuke points out: “If the Bank of Scotland could get $84 billion in a federal bail out in 2008 (Bank of America got a slim $91.4 billion) it would seem that the USPS might deserve more of a break. The rural post office closures will save $ l billion…Layoffs in the largely rural post office closures will result in around 4000 jobs lost.”

In Washington, this social cost is being ignored.

This article reviewing some of the materials presented at a symposium held by the Global Envelope Alliance last month in Washington is very much worth reading as an insight into the subject of geocodes. I highly recommend it. Executive Director.

http://www.presort.com/2011/11/10/addressing-the-world-how-geocodes-could-help-billions-start-using-the-mail/

Yesterday at the Consultative Committee meeting of the Universal Postal Union, the Association of Latin American Private Postal Operators (ALACOPP) presented the results of two studies that had been commissioned by their Argentinian member, Asociacion de Empresas de Correo de la Republica Argentina, AECA. This latter association represents 35 private postal operators who handle something approaching 60% of the postal traffic in the country. The membership of ALACOPP itself is drawn from eight countries between Mexico and Cape Horn and account for some 65% of all postal traffic in the continent and more than two million employees.

The presentation was given by the manager of the studies, Lic. Gabriel F. Perez, Environmental and Sustainable Development Committee Co-ordinator of AECA.

In brief, the two studies concluded that in terms of the environmental impact, the creation and transmission of a letter does not have a negative environmental impact, even including calculations relating to delivering by truck between distant cities. Both environmental and social impacts are measured.

A calculation of the carbon footprints of the same size of letter and an email with a 1 meg attachment revealed that the letter’s carbon footprint, taking delivery into account, is some 28.9 grams, while an email’s footprint is 44 grams. Please download the studyAssessment of Postal Activity: Argentina (68).

These two studies are the first to be done in Latin America and in the meeting at which presented, a representative of the postal regulator of Argentina praised the initiative of ACEA in undertaking them.

We observed to Earl Bender of Avenel Associates, a noted political consultant, that the OWS “group” was incompetent and should emulate the orgranizational discipline demonstrated by the Tea Party. Here is his very observant response. Editor.

Organized Tea Party?  Not really.  One minor segment of the extremely decentralized and mostly anti-centralization Tea Party was so organized.  The two groups displaying the most conventional organization are funded by big time conservative donors.  The Koch brothers ‘own’ one of these large organizations — it’s the most well funded Tea Party operation.  At this moment, I cannot recollect the other well-known right-wing organization bankrolling the other one.  (Less successfully, both also tried to give the Tea Party management teams of R political operatives.)

 In Georgia there are at least 3 significant, frequently feuding Tea Parties.  Numerous other states are similarly divided.  There is constant backbiting about who speaks for the movement nationally.  Hint: this is why the media turns to electeds to find Tea Party spokesmodels.  [Jim DeMint & Michelle Bachmann]

 The Tea Party’s policy aims seem clearer, though they divide over many things too.  States rights, national defense, foreign wars, programs to cut, etc.  The no taxes mantra penetrates because it matches the dominant conservative meme.

 To appropriate Herman Cain’s malaprop, the Tea Party is apples, OWS is oranges.  Admittedly, this is (literally) non-sense. But, I aver, so is most of the cant about Occupy Wall Street.

 OWS lack of organization has “caused” its explosive growth in the U.S. and worldwide.  300,000 in Rome?  More realistically, growth is the result of (not caused by) the continuing empty vessel strategy.

 The media is incapable of understanding that many, many individuals’ rage is fueled by a rejection of institutions.  Copping Will Rogers’ line, they are not members of any organized Party.  Many are the radical center who are truly disgusted by Rs and Ds and power players from any establishment — corporate, government, etc.  Identifying with specific goals or programs would tie OWS into the very entities it is demonstrably rejecting.

 So OWS has been on the front pages and in the evening news most every day for more than five weeks.  Protests have been exported globally in a way not seen since 1968.  They’re happy, fed and seemingly bathed.  Why would you fix what ain’t broke?

 When you try to shift to an World Wide Web cultural frame of reference, this success seems even more marked.  That’s where they live, NOT in Romney’s boardroom culture.  This is a polite, sustained, national middle class riot.

For me, the important take away is the depth of antipathy to Wall Street and big banks.  This entire movement is calling them out.  People’s anger is profound, considered and enduring.   4-6 million estimated foreclosure — pretty soon you are talking riot in the streets rage. 

Washington just doesn’t get who the public blames for this crisis and continuing recession.  OWS wanted, and still wants, to see lots of investment bankers go to jail.  They want to see them shackled, thrown out of their penthouses and summer cottage-manses in the Hamptons, and perp-walked to jail like Madoff.  The iron triangle of the finance industry is the vampire and the villagers want to burn it down and put a stake in its heart.  This idea is striking a responsive chord with the whole public.

 Right now, there is absolutely no need for OWS to manifest differently.  Doing so risks drowning their success in the bathtub.

Earl Bender

Pass this one on: the US Department of Commerce continues to surprise me. Their resources and sophistication seem to be growing on a daily basis. The latest email introduces six very important markets and the resources available to American companies to research and enter those markets:

October 9 is World Post Day

Posts worldwide celebrate the essential values of a global public service

World Post Day celebrations have begun in earnest this week in various parts of the world. Many locations are organizing ceremonies, contests, open days at post offices, stamp exhibitions and many more activities to draw attention to a global public service that continues to meet the communication needs of people and businesses every day.

In his annual World Post Day message, the Universal Postal Union’s director general, Edouard Dayan, asks people everywhere to “remember the fundamental values of the Post and the numerous public services it offers to people everywhere, which contribute to the economic development of countries”. He adds: “In this era of rapidly developing information technologies [Posts] are still managing to hold their own. They continue to ensure a vital communication link between people and businesses worldwide.”

Watch his video message at: www.youtube.com/universalpostalunion (The message is available in English and in French.)

Read his message at: www.upu.int/worldpostday

Many Posts normally use World Post Day to launch the UPU’s 2012 International Letter-Writing Competition, which is inviting young people to write a letter to an athlete or sports personality they admire to tell them what the Olympic Games mean to them.

Barbados’ Charlée Gittens and China’s Wang Sa, joint winners of the 2011 competition, will also receive their gold medals and prizes during ceremonies being held in their respective countries.

World Post Day is celebrated annually on 9 October, the anniversary date of the creation of the Universal Postal Union, the second oldest intergovernmental organization in the world and a United Nations specialized agency for postal services.

Follow
World Post Day activities on the UPU’s Facebook page.

About the UPU

Created in 1874, the UPU, based in Berne (Switzerland), is an intergovernmental organization and the primary forum for cooperation between governments, Posts and other stakeholders of the worldwide postal sector. In addition to maintaining a genuinely universal network that provides modern products and services, it establishes the rules for international mail exchanges among its 192 members and makes recommendations to stimulate mail volume growth and to improve the quality of service for customers. The UPU celebrated 60 years as a specialized agency of the United Nations in 2008.

CONTACT

Rhéal LeBlanc

Media relations

Universal Postal Union

T  +41 31 350 32 51

M +41 79 345 97 64

rheal.leblanc@upu.int