There are three ways that companies can improve by using a Pitney Bowes Postage Meter:

The first is time. How often does your company send help to the post office to buy stamps, send out packages, or for any number of critical services? Every single time that staff has to step out of the office to perform this service is time taken away from the productivity of the business. Depending on how many miles the post office is, this will add to the fees in the form of tolls, gas, or parking feeds, depending on where the business operates. By utilizing a Pitney Bowes Postage Meter, businesses can print their own postage directly onto the letters or packages and then have the postal carrier collect them daily.

A second way the Pitney Bowes Postage Meter can help a business is by allowing the business to create accounts for different departments. By determining whether a department or individual is sending out an inordinate amount of mail every day, week, or month, that business can possibly find ways to improve the operation or seek out alternatives to this costly situation. Perhaps one section is sending out letters, yet most of the physical mailing addresses also have an email address. By sending regular updates through the email, a business could save on postage.

The third way a Pitney Bowes Postage Meter can help business is by adding a dimension of professionalism to the outgoing mail. Instead of ordinary stamps, the Pitney Bowes Postage Meter2 prints professional-looking postage straight onto the letters, or if a package is being sent, then it prints out the indicia with the exact shipping amount. When a consumer receives mail from a business that looks professional, their opinion of that business almost always improves.

Sometimes it’s not what a company does but more about what image it puts forth that defines success. All businesses can save time and money using the Pitney Bowes Postage Meter. A Pitney Bowes Postage Meter can help improve any business.

Some postage scales will give you a comparison rate for other services such as UPS, DHL, and Fed Ex. This is a major benefit that allows your business to save even more money by practicing economical savings.

Postage Meters for your Shipping Supplies

The postage meter differs from your postal scale in the fact that your meter is the part that actually stamps the postage on your mail. A postal scale simply gives you a weight. According to federal law the USPS cannot sell a postage meter – they can only lease one to you.

Your postage meter will save you tremendously on your shipping supplies. Not only can you handle major shipping projects from the comfort of your home office, you can conveniently have all of your business mail professionally stamped with the “metered” mark.

If your business spends more than fifty dollars per month in shipping, then you will most likely benefit from a leased Postage Meter. Your Postage Meter will hold up to $1,000 worth of postage at a time. If you need to order more postage, you can hook your phone line to your meter and download more postage from your USPS store. This saves time in the fact that you won’t have to keep running off the store, every time you want to mail a business letter or package.

Digital Postage and Shipping UPS Scales

You can also purchase digital shipping scales that are compatible with UPS. These scales are perfect for both shipping and receiving. A Postage UPS scale is perfect for mailrooms and handling office mail. Again, make sure that your selected scale of choice can handle the weight limits that you need as well as weighs in the form that you require.

Some features that may help influence your choice of UPS scale include, easy digital readouts, ability to connect your UPS scale to a computer, readings in precision increments, shock and overload protected, ability to handle gross weight measurements, and rechargeable batteries.

By using UPS compatible scales, you can rest assured that your business will be able to handle all of its mailroom needs, shipping and packaging needs, as well as handle weights for warehouse operations.

The postage meter was introduced in the United States in 1912 by Arthur Pitney, who in 1920 went into business with partner Walter Bowes in order to produce the machines.

Postage meters have evolved from purely mechanical devices to today’s Internet-based postage dispensing services. The evolution of the postage meter is covered in the following sections.

Types of Postage Meters

Mechanical, manual and rotary-print head Postage Meters

Mechanical meters are letterpress meters that had to be taken to the post office and physically reset by a postal official. These meters were decertified and taken out of circulation by the USPS in 1999.

Manual Set and Rotary Print Head meters were decertified by the USPS in 2002. While more advanced, including remote meter resetting capabilities, this early technology was deemed susceptible to tampering.

Digital Postage Meters

With Digital Print Meters, postage is added through a modem connection. Postage is printed through an inkjet cartridge using special postage ink. The most advanced systems print Information Based Indicia (IBI), a 2-dimensional Data Matrix or bar code combined with visually identifiable characters and symbols. The data matrix contains such information as amount of postage, origin zip code, destination, mail class, weight, and confirmation/tracking numbers.

Leading systems also include IntelliLink technology, which provides access to a complete suite of management information and USPS services such as Delivery Confirmation, Signature Confirmation, Certified Mail and e-Return Receipt. Other preferred features include Weigh-on-the-Weigh and Shape-Based Rating, which automatically calculate the correct postage for mixed-weight and mixed-sized mail.

There are a number of companies offering postage meters, also called franking machines.

Internet and Stamp Based Postage Meters

While most mailers use mailing systems, new technologies are making metered mail accessible to even the smallest of businesses.

eBay and PayPal users can print labels with postage using eBay’s online postage solution and pay using their PayPal account. This technology, powered by Pitney Bowes, provides for a completely browser-based online postage solution.

Other technologies allow you to print postage from your computer, or from small stamp printers. In the first consumer application for postage meters, customized stamps are also possible.

In 1999 Stamps.com became the first organization to be licensed by the United States Postal Service to print valid postage from a traditional PC printer. Their system allows the user to automatically download and print postage directly onto an envelope or “Netstamp”.

Source: Wikipedia

As well as franking machines and postal scales, Neopost also manufactures machines for folding letters and inserting them into envelopes, letter opening machines, scanners for detecting suspicious items of mail and various other mail-related services. They also manufacture and sell consumables for their equipment, including ink cartridges and customized envelopes optimized for their machines.

Gained in 75 years of history of growth, Neopost has a wealth experience, marked by significant acquisitions.

- 1924 Founding of Neopost Limited (United Kingdom)
- 1929 Founding of SMH, Société des Machines Havas (France)
- 1930 Acquisition of Neopost by Roneo (United Kingdom)
- 1935 Creation of Neopost brand name (United Kingdom)
- 1970 Acquisition by C.G.E. of SMH-Adrex (France)
- 1979 Acquisition by C.G.E. of Friden (United States)
- 1980 Acquisition by C.G.E. of Roneo and Hadewe (United Kingdom and Netherlands)
- 1981 Attached to Alcatel, subsidiary of C.G.E. (France)
- 1992 Foundation of Neopost Group
- 1997 A group of investors, advised by BC Partners and in association with management, took control of Neopost
- 1999 Neopost was floated on the Premier Marché of Euronext Paris on 23 February at a price of €15 per share
- 2002 Acquisition of Stielow and Hasler (Germany and Switzerland)
- 2003 Neopost completed the integration of companies acquired in 2002, sold Stielow’s non-core label printing and print finishing businesses, and strengthened its operating structures
- 2006 To enhance its international profile, the Group adopted a new visual identity and tagline “We value your mail” at the beginning of 2006

This demonstrates the Group’s commitment to its customers. The new visual identity reinforce Neopost’s image around the world and act as a unifying force for all the Group’s subsidiaries. The new tagline, “we value your mail”, clearly illustrates the Group’s mission and ambitions: to add value and improve mail management through innovation for both companies and postal organisations.

- 2007/2008 Acquisition of Valipost, PFE, RENA and NBG-ID

Sources: Nepoat.com & Wikipedia

A rapid increase in mail volume in 1919 made the Post Office more receptive to metered mail, and Pitney subsequently traveled to meet Bowes. On March 15, 1920, the United States House of Representatives passed a bill authorizing mechanical stamps on First-Class Mail, and on April 23, 1920, the two companies merged to form the Pitney Bowes Postage Meter Company, with the goal of producing a machine that would combine Pitney’s “double-locking” counter with Bowes’s system for wrapping postage payment, postmarking and cancellation. The United States Post Office approved their postage meter on August 25, 1920.

Between 1922 and 1923, the government collected $4,359,070 in postage from the first commercial installations of 400 meters. Pitney Bowes also began to sell their products internationally.

In 1938, Walter H. Wheeler, Jr. was named President and Chairman of the Board and would lead the company over the next three decades. In the 1940s, Wheeler boycotted a hotel when it refused to register one African American salesperson, championing a spirit of diversity that still exists today, writing: “Pitney Bowes’ worksites will reflect the communities in which we operate.”

Pitney-Bowes received an Army-Navy ‘E’ Award denoting excellence in production of crucially needed instruments of war on February 1, 1943 .

The company was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1950. The same year, the National Urban League recognized Pitney Bowes for its leadership in providing job opportunities to African Americans.

Pitney Bowes was named to the S&P 500 at the time of its creation in 1957 and joined the Fortune 500 in 1962.

In 1968 Pitney Bowes acquired the Monarch Marking System Company, which would produce the first barcode equipment for retail trade use. In 1976, the Pitney Bowes Credit Corporation was formed, providing customers with financing and payment solutions. (Pitney Bowes would continue to grow this line of business, launching the Pitney Bowes Bank in 1996.)

In the 1980s, the firm expanded, offering copy machines and facsimile machines, a suite of management services and entering new markets, such as Japan.

In the 1990s, Pitney Bowes continued to innovate in the field of digital technologies and software, introducing the AddressRight address & barcode printer (1991), the first in-line weighing and metering system (1992), the first secure digital postage meter (1995), the first ink jet postage meter (1996) and the Digital Document Deliver (D3) platform (1998) which provides message management via hard copy, web, email and fax.

Between 2000 and 2007, Pitney Bowes invested $2.5 billion in 83 acquisitions, primarily in software and services businesses including MapInfo, Group 1 Software, PSI Group and Imagitas. The company is known as an industry advocate, and has focused in recent years on advancing postal reform, the USPS Intelligent Mail barcode, transpromo and environmental sustainability.

Source: Wikipedia