Addressing drives everything we do at Canada Post. Managing addresses is one of our core competencies. The Address Improvement Program was Canada Post's initiative to improve the address information provided to customers.

• Description of the Address Improvement Program
• The Address Management System (AMS) Database
• Types of Changes to Address Data and what they mean for customers
• Address Accuracy
• Contact Us

The Address Improvement Program (AIP) remodelled the processes that Canada Post uses to create and maintain addressing and delivery information. As part of this effort, the Address Improvement team has created a new single database housed within the Address Management System (AMS) to replace the Postal Code Support System (PCSS).

On July 18^th, the Address Management System became the single corporate home for addressing, geographic and delivery information for Canada Post and our customers. The database has been built using Geographic Information System technology, which simply means that the new database will relate address range information to other geographic information. To ensure that this multi-layered database will be kept up-to-date and accurate, Canada Post has also remodelled the business processes used for managing address information.

AIP helps Commercial customers

Providing mailers with cleaner, more accurate address information was the primary focus of the AIP initiative.

The data elements that were validated by the Address Improvement Project team have been communicated to customers in the Data Product updates. This process will not change and customers will continue to receive the benefits of:

• More accurate address information in the Address Data Products (e.g. Postal Code Address Data)
• Quality data will improve mail deliverability
• More accurate householder counts

Mailers will have more accurate householder counts to allow them to print and prepare correct volumes for Unaddressed Admail campaigns. Improved return on investment for advertising campaigns is a direct result of having more accurate householder information.

The AIP initiative also collected and updated street names (example Street to Road), rural delivery addresses, civic addresses for rural routes (where they exist and are used by customers), PO Box addresses that are used as a primary mailing address. Better-addressed mail means decreased mail returns, improved service and reduced costs for mailers.

The AIP team worked closely with customers, associations and suppliers to minimize any challenges caused by updating address information. As a result, there are no changes to Address Accuracy rules, the specifications of current data products and the format of data files. Data will still appear in ranges and will continue to be distributed in the same medium (e.g. FTP downloads, CD's and tape cartridges).

Analysis of the updated address information shows that the key data changes will be evident in:

• Householder counts. The number of houses, apartments, businesses and farms have been updated.
  
  
• Address ranges. Data products such as Postal Code Address Data (PCAD) will have changes to the minimum and maximum address ranges. For example, the previous range may have been 1-25 Main Street. The verified range may be 3-21 Main Street.
  
  
• Suite Numbers for apartments, condominiums etc. will also be added to our address information. To minimize the impact on customers, the suite information will be provided in ranges. There will be one minimum to maximum range per building.
  
  
• Street names and municipalities' names. There have also been minor corrections to street names, municipality names (spelling, punctuation, etc).

• Unaddressed Admail™customers may need to adjust the number of mail pieces that are printed and prepared to reflect the changes in householder counts and householder types (houses, apartments, farms, businesses).
• Addressed Admail™, Publication Mail™, Lettermail Incentive customers (using Address Accuracy) will see more accurate address information in the software they receive from SERP vendors. Customers' mailing lists may also need to be adjusted.
• Subscribers to Postal Code Address Data and Delivery Mode files will see more accurate address data. Customers' internal files that use the address data products may need to be updated and/or modified.

Please remember that customers must generate a new Statement of Accuracy a minimum of once a year, as outlined in the Address Accuracy Program Customer Guide.