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Automated Package Verification (APV) System

The Automated Package Verification System, APV, is a USPS system built to capture postage discrepancies. Its purpose is to recover them automatically, in a way that protects the customer relationship. It sends each postage adjustment to a vendor, who pays or collects it and lets the customer dispute it.

Updated October 31, 20267 sources

What it is

APV automates the postage due process. Postage due is the additional postage owed to USPS after a mailpiece enters the mailstream. USPS built APV to automate and streamline that work and to give customers a better experience. It also brings USPS in line with the practices of its competitors.

Why USPS built it

PC Postage is postage that customers buy and print from a personal computer, through USPS-authorized commercial vendors. Revenue assurance for PC Postage relies heavily on the manual postage due process. Employees find each case by hand, in acceptance and processing.

Manual detection is imperfect. Only a limited share of PC Postage volume enters at the retail counter, so the counter has little chance to find shortpaid pieces and add postage. Many PC Postage labels also leave off the amount of postage paid, which USPS calls stealth or hidden postage. That makes manual detection harder at the counter and throughout the processing and delivery network.

How it works

APV finds and prices the discrepancy, and the vendor settles it with the customer.

  1. APV detects a postage discrepancy and calculates the postage adjustment.
  2. APV submits a file to the vendor with the data that supports the adjustment.
  3. The vendor pays or collects the adjustment amount.
  4. The vendor lets the customer dispute the adjustment.
  5. APV keeps records of every item tied to the adjustment and any dispute.

What the sources leave open

The sources here don't say how APV detects a discrepancy, what the vendor file holds, or how long a customer has to dispute an adjustment.

Terms

PC Postage
A hardware/software-based postage evidencing system offered by USPS-authorized providers (commercial vendors) for purchasing and printing Information-Based Indicia (IBI) postage from a personal computer, a printer, and Internet access. PC Postage product/service offerings are also available online through USPS.
indiciaindicium
Imprinted designation and markings on mail that denote postage payment (e.g., permit imprint, metered postage, and PC Postage products). Broadly, the term can include postage stamps. In many instances, the amount of postage paid is not displayed on the mailpiece. Although the term is technically the plural of indicium, indicia may be used like the term data to indicate singular or plural.
Information-Based IndiciaIBI, IBIP, Information Based Indicia Program
a secure postage evidencing standard used by the United States Postal Service (USPS) to indicate electronic postage payment.
Postage DuePD
Insufficient postage. Additional postage owed USPS after the mailpiece is entered into the mailstream.
shortpaid mailpostage due mail
Mail with insufficient postage that is either returned to the mailer for additional postage if identified at the mailing office or delivered to the addressee after the collection of the additional postage due.
revenue assurance
An ongoing policy to prevent the loss of revenue by identifying uncanceled postage stamps, and misclassified mail and collecting postage and fees for unpaid or shortpaid mail

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