When presorting a trayed mailing in Professional Pesort, DeskTop Mailer, or Business Edition, there are three available options for handling overflow pieces. Below is a list of all three with a short description.
Keep in mind that every sortation is different and all depends on how your job sorts out but below are the typical reasons for choosing each option.
None - When the USPS rules state that overflow trays can be made but are not required you can choose to create these trays or not. If you set the overflow option to NONE the trays will not be created. This will cause the pieces what would have been in an overflow tray to fall in the sortation and most likely be charged a higher rate. One good reason for using this option would be to create fewer trays and fuller trays which may help with production costs.
Here is an example. Let's say that I have 556 pieces that sort to a 5 digit automation tray... but based on my piece thickness I can only fit 500 pieces in a tray. If the overflow tray option is set to NONE, these pieces would not be put into an overflow tray, instead they would fall down to group with other pieces, maybe the fall into an AADC tray. I would end up paying more postage on those 56 pieces but I wouldn't have a tray with only 56 pieces in it.
Overflow - When the USPS rules permit an overflow tray for that sortation level, if this option is set to OVERFLOW an additional tray can be made per destination for any pieces that did not fit into the previous tray. This can cause more trays to be created, in which case these trays would not be full trays. This can increase production cost but can save on postage.
Using the same example as above... the 56 pieces that did not fit into the 5 digit tray would end up going into an overflow tray. They would still get the 5 digit rate but you would have a tray that is not full.
Reduced - The reduced option allows mailers place the overflow pieces in the next tray level but still retain the same postage. This option can help reduce postage and production costs by creating fewer fuller trays. This option is not available for Periodical sortations.
Again, going back to the above example, if there were 556 pieces, only 500 fit into a tray, the 56 pieces can be placed in a 3 digit tray but still retain the 5 digit rate.
This can look a little strange when looking at the qualification report as you may see pieces in a 3 digit tray - some getting a 5 digit rate and some getting a 3 digit rate, however, you will notice that anything that was overflow mail is marked with an Astrisk "*".
Keep in mind that the default setting for the overflow tray option is REDUCED. If you would rather not make overflow trays or you want the overflow pieces to be placed in a separate tray make sure to change this in your Presort Scheme Details or Presort Scheme Block.
