The U.S. Postal Service urged the Postal Rate Commission this week to speed up the process for approving negotiated service agreements, which provide pricing incentives to mailers based on increased mail volume and productivity gains.
The USPS recommended that the PRC set a time limit of 150 days to review NSA requests. It took 239 days for the PRC to endorse the first NSA, given to credit card company Capital One Financial Corp. in May. Postal officials said that a streamlined approval process is needed to encourage other mailers to pursue discounts.
In the Capital One deal, Capital One will get discounts of 3 cents to 6 cents per piece for the next three years if its annual First-Class bulk volume exceeds 1.225 billion pieces. The discounts rise as Capital One's volume increases. The agreement began Sept. 1.
