POSTAL SERVICE USES HIGH TECH EQUIPMENT TO PROCESS THE MAIL

If you want your mail to get to its destination quicker, Mike Heuschober has a suggestion.

Type the address on the envelope, and leave the punctuation behind, says Heuschober.

The reason? In order to process 700,000 to 800,000 pieces of daily mail in less time than ever, the post office has turned to state-of-the-art computer and optical technology.

Such technology functions best without having to read hand-written or typed commas, periods, etc.

Heuschober is plant manager of the U.S. Postal Service's Mail Processing and Distribution Center. The center opened in November 1991.

The mail center processes all classes of incoming and outgoing mail and parcels coming from - or going to - Southeast Missouri post offices.

The center services post offices from Park Hills and Ste. Genevieve, south to the Arkansas state line, and as far west as Poplar Bluff.

The Cape Girardeau mail processing and distribution center is one of a number of processing and distribution centers that have been opened throughout the United States during the past five years.

During a typical 24-hour period, postal workers at the Cape Girardeau mail processing and distribution center, will process 700,000 to 800,000 pieces of mail, or about 4.6 million pieces of mail per seven-day-week. That includes all priority, first class and lower class mail, bulk mail, and parcels.

Of the total amount of mail processed at the center each day, about half - or approximately 400,000 pieces, goes to, or comes from, post offices within the four (636, 637, 638, and 639) Southeast Missouri zip codes.

Heuschober said the most standard size envelope mail is now processed by optical character readers and bar-code sorters that can process up to 23,000 pieces of mail per hour.

By comparison, the old mail sorter at the Cape Girardeau post office could only process about 2,000 pieces of mail per hour.

"The optical character reader reads the typed or block-printed address on the envelope, then tells the computer to print a bar code on the envelope with the same address and zip code information," explained Heuschober.

"The bar code data is used by the sorting machine to sort the mail to its proper destination.

"The optical scanner cannot read handwritten addresses. When handwritten envelopes pass through the bar code machine, they're kicked out and have to be sorted by hand." He said the post office is now working to develop scanners and readers that may eventually be able to read most handwritten addresses.

The work day for most of the center's postal workers begins at 6 p.m. During the day, maintenance technicians clean, and if needed, repair, the high-speed sorting equipment. A small staff of clerks process any mail that has come in.

Around 6:30 p.m., the first of the mail trucks arrives at the center bringing mail from all of the four zip code region post offices in southeast Missouri.

"Our first priority is to process and distribute all of the outgoing mail to meet our early morning deadline," said Heuschober. "The mail trucks arrive on a staggered schedule.

The sacks of mail are opened, and small envelope mail separated from the larger mail and parcel packages. The regular-size envelope mail goes through the canceling machine and is immediately sent to the optical character reader.

After the bar code is printed on the envelope, the letter goes through the sorting machine, which "reads" the bar code and directs the envelope to the proper destination bin.

Heuschober said the center's bar code reader can sort mail with up to an eleven-number zip code.

"We now do eleven number zip code sorting for the Jackson and Dexter post offices," he said. "This means when the mail for Jackson and Dexter leaves the Cape Girardeau processing and distribution center, it is already presorted by city, street, block, and house number, and in the order in which the carrier will deliver the mail on his route each day.

"That means mail carriers in these two post offices no longer have to sort their mail before they leave in the morning. However, the mail still has to be sorted by block and house number by the mail carriers in the other post offices."

Heuschober said the eleven-digit zip code is coming to Cape Girardeau in June or July.

After the outgoing mail is sorted, it is placed in mail bags and put on board mail trucks.

All mail not destined for one of the four Southeast Missouri zip codes is picked up by one of the mail trucks that travels between Memphis and St. Louis.

"It's almost like the old mail trains that used to come through town. We have to have our outgoing mail sorted and ready to go when the mail trucks arrive from St. Louis and Memphis," said Heuschober.

"First class mail that's destined for distant post offices goes directly to the postal processing center at Lambert St. Louis International Airport, and is put on board one of our contract airline jets.

"Mail that can be delivered in one day from the Cape center goes by surface transportation."

After all of the outgoing mail has been dispatched, the focus turns to incoming mail that's destined for post offices within the center's four zip code service area. The first to go out is mail for the more distant post offices. The last of the incoming mail to be processed is for Cape Girardeau, since the post office is located near the center.

The first Cape mail usually leaves the center around 5:30 a.m., so it can be put up in the post office boxes. The rest of the mail is delivered a short time later.