Avoiding
Mailing by Hand
by Wiley Lane
If
you're anything like me, you really hate to do even a small mailing by
hand. Doing the presort, hand writing the tray tables and the postage
forms are a real chore. The other day, a customer sent me a list of 246
names and addresses to be mailed. The problem was that they were in label
format in "Word Perfect." I managed to print the labels out of
the "Word Perfect," file, but was unable to convert it into a
MAILERS+4 file. So at this point, I could do the mailing, but I would have
to write all the forms by hand. To work around this predicament, using
MAILERS+4, I created a database that contained only one field...a ZIP Code
field. I quickly inputted all 246 ZIP Codes and was able to presort in
MAILERS+4, and get my tray tables and postage reports. It took a little
time and ingenuity, but not as much effort as doing the entire mailing by
hand.