Stamps.com's Customer Care team celebrated Memorial Day with a Potluck Party. These steaks tasted as good as they looked!

It’s Friday, the start of a long, beautiful Memorial Day weekend. And our Customer Care Team is doing a superb job of multitasking between providing customer service and eating delicious barbecue, courtesy of the Stamps.com Memorial Day Potluck.

Food of Champions
When our Customer Care Team isn’t earning industry recognition (they were declared a 2011 ABA Customer Service Department of the Year finalist last week), they love to host company celebrations and today’s potluck is a hit! What’s on the menu? Barbecue-style chicken and meats, potato salad, rice, collard greens and fruit. The food is mighty delicious and, interestingly enough, it’s also well-travelled.

Fun Facts: Food Miles
While providing online postage and award-winning shipping solutions, we often come across interesting shipping facts, like food miles. It’s a term that refers to the distance food is transported from the time of its production until it reaches the consumer.

Did you know:

• On average, food travels between 1,500 to 2,500 miles* every time that it is delivered to the consumer.
• Red meat travels an average total distance of 248 miles.
• Beverages travel an average shipping distance around 205 miles.

Shipping and Cooking Know-how
Want more shipping facts and information? Or are you in need a grilling tip? Our Stamps.com Customer Care Team is available 6 am to 6 pm PT Monday to Friday, with 24/7 support also available for high volume shippers. We look forward to providing you with excellent customer service. And if you plan to enjoy barbecue or other foods over the weekend, bon appétit!

Need to contact Stamps.com Customer Care?
Phone: 1-888-434-0055
Email: support@stamps.com
Hours: Monday-Friday, 6am to 6pm PT

* Source:  Wikipedia

Providing an award-winning customer experience
“Thank you for calling Stamps.com, your complete mailing and shipping solution. How may I help you today?” Those are famous words from our Stamps.com Customer Service team who was named a finalist in the “Customer Service Department of the Year” category in the 2011 American Business Awards. Members of 10 specialized final judging committees will select winners from among the Finalists in each category in June.

American Business Awards – the nation’s premier business awards
Being a 2011 ABA finalist is an honor for Stamps.com and our Customer Service team. The American Business Awards are the nation’s premier business awards program. All organizations operating in the U.S.A. are eligible to submit nominations – public and private, for-profit and non-profit, large and small. Details about the American Business Awards and the list of Finalists in all categories are available at http://www.stevieawards.com/aba.

Our Customer Service department operates a 100-seat facility at Stamps.com corporate headquarters and provides customer services ranging from tech support, account management and troubleshooting for approximately 400,000 clients who print USPS-approved postage and shipping labels online. The Stamps.com customer service department is available 6 am to 6 pm PT Monday to Friday, with 24/7 support also available for high volume shippers.

Director of Customer Service Dawn Stevenson

Putting customer service in online postage
As a 2011 ABA Customer Service Department of the Year finalist, we’re proud to offer some of the best customer service in online postage. We continuously seek excellence in all we do and couldn’t be more proud of our Customer Service team! If you’re in need of assistance, they can be reached toll-free at 1-888-434-0055. Each call begins with a warm greeting and ends with award-winning customer service.

USPS and the National Association of Letter Carriers are hosting their annual Stamp Out Hunger National Food Drive this Saturday, May 14.  USPS Mail Carriers will collect non-perishable food donations left by mailboxes and will deliver the items to local community food banks and shelters. 

Now in its 19th year, the Stamp Out Hunger effort is the nation’s largest single-day food drive. In 2010, the food drive not only set a record with a total of 77.1 million pounds of food donated, but also surpassed one billion pounds of food collected over the 18-year history of the drive.

To help, all you need to do is place a box or can of non-perishable food* next to your mailbox before your letter carrier delivers mail on Saturday, May 14.  The carrier will then take all the food collected back to a postal station, sort and then deliver the items to an area food bank or pantry.

*Important Note:  Please donate items like canned meats, fish, soup, vegetables; bottled juice, pasta, cereal and rice that do not require refrigeration.  Please do not include items that have expired or are in glass containers.

Get more info about the Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive

Example of SCAN Form

When mailing multiple packages at the same time, many shippers like for U.S. Postal Service employees to scan the  barcode on each package to create an “acceptance” event of their shipment.  This “acceptance” scan will show the recipient of the package that their shipment is on its way and the package has entered the USPS mailstream. 

However, if your package only contains Delivery Confirmation, it’s possible that the USPS employee might only scan the item once the package is being delivered to its destination and not when the package is dropped at off at the Post Office.   To help shippers show the package has been sent, the USPS suggests including a SCAN Form at the time of mailing.   

What is a SCAN Form?
The SCAN Form, which stands for Shipment Confirmation Acceptance Notice, is a piece of paper that contains a master barcode that includes all the packages associated in a shipment.  The SCAN Form saves the USPS employee time by allowing them to scan only one barcode (the SCAN Form) to enter all of the associated packages into the USPS’s Track & Confirm database rather than scanning each package individually. Once scanned, both you and the package recipient can see the date the package entered mailstream.

SCAN Form Restrictions
The U.S. Postal Service has placed some restrictions on SCAN Forms:

• SCAN Forms are only available for shipping labels purchased with online postage.
• Every item associated with a form must be printed and mailed on the same date and from the same ZIP code.
• An item can’t appear on more than one SCAN Form.
• You have to buy electronic Delivery Confirmation or electronic Signature Confirmation in order to use a SCAN Form.

Thankfully, SCAN Forms are easy to use. Stamps.com’s software guides you through the process of creating one as you’re preparing your outgoing packages. Here are a few tips to keep in mind as you become more familiar with SCAN Forms:

SCAN Form Tip #1
Don’t print a SCAN Form until you’ve finished printing shipping labels for the day. Stamps.com recommends completing this process before 5 p.m., after which the software will submit your package information to USPS. If this information is sent without a SCAN Form, you won’t be able to include them on it and it will take longer for a postal employee to accept your packages into the system.

SCAN Form Tip #2
If the SCAN Form button is disabled in your Stamps.com software, it means you have selected a package that can’t be sent with a SCAN Form. A common reason this may happen if you have not added electronic Delivery Confirmation or electronic Signature Confirmation to that item.

SCAN Form Tip #3
If you remove a package from a set of parcels on a SCAN Form, USPS will not allow you to use the SCAN Form.  The carrier will need to scan each package individually.

SCAN Form Tip #4
Online package tracking of your parcels sent may not be updated until the following day, depending on when you submit your SCAN Form and packages to a USPS employee.

Click here for more information on SCAN Forms.