USPS Postal Indicia Guidelines For a full lisiting of all indicia requirements, review the Domestic Mail Manual on the USPS website, 604 Postage Payment Methods, section 5.0 Permit Imprint (Indicia) The guidelines below apply to the majority of mailings performed in-house at Holley’s Printing. Contact the art department for a first-class or standard indicia eps to incorporate into your design when Holley’s processes your mailings. Minimum Quantity Use of a postal indicia (printed permit) requires at least 200 pieces for a standard mailing and 500 for a first class mailing. Indicia Design & Placement An indicia may be placed on a mailing piece by one of the following means: printing, hand stamp or any other acceptable way to print on the piece. An indicia that has been hand written or typed will not be accepted. Indicia Color The post office requires that the printed permit and the paper or ink colors used be legible and have enough contrast so that it can be easily read. We recommend that the rule around the indicia and text are set in black or a similarly dark color and the background is white to avoid any problems. Indicia Placement The United States Post Office has specific requirements for the placement and format of permit imprints. The following information is taken directly from DMM #604 which is found on www.usps.com. The permit imprint indicia must be printed parallel with the address of the mailpiece. It must be placed in one of these four positions: a. Upper right corner of the mailpiece. b. Upper right corner of the address area. c. To the right of the address on an address label. d. To the right of the address on an insert appearing through a window envelope. Indicia Do’s & Don’ts Do include these required elements of a Permit Imprint Indicia, including: Line 1: Rate Marking Line 2: The words “US Postage Paid” Line 3: City and state where permit is held Line 4: The words “Permit No.” and your permit number Don’t forget to check that you included critical elements into your Permit Imprint Indicia. • It must show your city, state and permit number. • It may be only four or five lines long. • It must appear to the upper right of the delivery address. SEE EXAMPLES BELOW Optional Indicia Format Permit imprint indicia may be prepared in a format other than the basic format described in 5.3.10, subject to these conditions: a. The rule that forms a box around the content of the indicia may be omitted if the content remains as specified in 5.3.6 through 5.3.9 and 5.3.10. b. Unless printed directly on an address label, the indicia content must be placed within a clear area no smaller than 1/2 inch high and 1/2 inch wide, no more than 1-1/2 inches below or left from the upper right corner of the mailpiece or of the address area when oriented to read the address, regardless of processing category or postage rate claimed. If printed on an address label (including paper, adhesive, and multilayer sandwich labels), the space allowed for the indicia content must be rectangular, large enough to ensure legibility of that content from a normal reading distance and to separate it from other information on the label, and located in the upper right corner of the label when oriented to read the address. c. No printing appears in the indicia other than that required or allowed under 5.3.6 through 5.3.9. d. Except as required to enclose the permit information, no printing appears above or to the right of the permit information when the indicia is printed directly on the mailpiece or within the address area or on the address label. e. Except for indicia printed on address labels, the permit information is printed in no smaller than 4-point type. In indicia printed on address labels under 5.3.11b, the permit information must be legible. f. Except as required to enclose the permit information, decorative designs intended to be part of the indicia design must appear below or to the left of the permit information in an area extending no farther than 4-1/2 inches to the left of the right edge, and 1-1/2 inches below the top edge of the mailpiece, address area, or address label, as applicable. Such designs must not resemble or imitate a postage meter imprint, postage stamp, postcard postage, or other postage payment method; and they must not include words, symbols, or designs used by the USPS to identify a class of mail, rate of postage, or level of service, unless such elements are correctly used under the applicable standards for the mailpiece on which they appear and the corresponding postage and fees have been paid. g. All other applicable standards in 5.0 are met. Postal information courtesy of United States Postal Service website: www.usps.com Note: These are only examples; not all possible variations are shown.