April 18: Bulk mailers like corporate houses in the city will no longer have to worry about mass mailing of business letters and bills, thanks to the introduction of the business post service by the department of post and telegraph.

The only thing the bulk mailers will have to do is to contact the business development centre at Meghdoot Bhavan complex in the city to hand over the task.

The service provider will collect the material from the doorstep of the mailer and take care of all the pre-mailing activities, with computerised labelling, all for a surcharge of about 40 paise per letter besides the normal postage tariff.

The department charges an additional 65 paise (optional) per envelope for special handling.

The business development department also deputes its personnel to do the pre-mail processing at the doorstep for confidential documents.

The personnel are engaged on a contractual basis.

“The pre-mail processing is the most laborious part of mass mailing, which involves collection of stationery like stamps and labels, pasting them, and then dropping the letters at the post office. We take the responsibility of the processing through computerised methods, which takes less time as well as energy,” said an official.

He said the service was basically aimed at mass mailers like corporate houses, telecom service providers and other bill and financial statement mailers inside and outside the city.

Citing an example, the official said a leading city hospital had recently mailed over 5,000 of its monthly journals, which the centre had successfully handled.

He said the centre was in contact with the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd for mailing of their telephone bills and the Assam State Electricity Board for the monthly power bills.

Some of the corporate houses have also shown positive response towards the centre regarding mailing their financial statements, promotional materials, annual reports, dividend warrants and stock certificates, the official added.

The business development centre engages at least 10 people for mail collection and processing everyday and recruits more people if required.

The centre handles distribution of invitation cards, admit cards and interview letters of educational institutions and other organisations.

Faster delivery is an additional feature that appeals to the business houses, which want prompt service, the official said, adding that the senders are also acknowledged after the delivery of their mails.

The service has been in great demand in larger cities of the country where it was introduced two years back.

The business here was also expected to be encouraging, official sources said.

The official also said the department would soon introduce e-bill post facility.

“The required software for the facility have been developed and will be ready for service within a very short period,” he said.

Once the facility is introduced, customers will be able to pay bills to subscribed billers through computerised online billing at the post office itself and even get printouts of their bills.

“This will save the billers from sending bills to the customers,” he added.