Six Benefits of Using a Franking Machine
1. Postal Discounts from Royal Mail
Royal Mail has dramatically increased the discounts on franked mail over the past years. This is because, for Royal Mail, handling franked items is a lot cheaper than issuing stamps and processing stamped mail.
In order to encourage more businesses to use franking machines, Royal Mail offers bigger discounts on postal charges for customers who frank their post. In some cases franking discounts have doubled in the last two years and this means even for a company that sends out small volumes of mail, buying or renting a franking machine can help to cut down on mailroom costs.
2. Presenting a professional image
Sending franked mail presents a professional image to your business partners and customers. Your franked stamp can be customized for your business and can contain your company logo and promotional text or other business messages.
Franking your mail gives you the opportunity to advertise your company for free. You can advertise new services, promotions and new offers. Using a franking machine that offers text messaging, you can even change the message on a daily basis.
3. Over Stamping
Most people end up doing this at some point. You have something that needs to be posted, but you are unsure of the weight, or don’t have the correct value of stamps so you end up over paying.
With a franking machine, especially one with an integral scale, this is never a problem. You get the correct postage, dial it in to the machine and frank it.
4. Under Stamping
Royal Mail used to charge the sender if postal items were under stamped. Now they will deliver the item to the recipient’s receiving office and ask the recipient to pick up the item and pay the difference plus a handling fee.
If a company accidentally under stamps mail, it causes inconvenience to its customers and also costs them money.
With a franking machine, it is easy to get the correct postage every time and avoid the embarrassment of under stamping.
5. Time Saving and Convenience
Stamps will run out at the most inconvenient time, this is just the way it is. Trips to the post office for more stamps are not only time consuming but also inconvenient.
Franking machines can be topped up 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and it only takes a minute. Even when the post office is shut you will never run out of postage.
Processing out-going mail also becomes less of an odious task. Mail items can be easily weighed and correct postage applied. Batches of letters can be quickly passed through the franking machine and on their way out the door.
6. Accountability and Recording Expenditure
At tax return time franking machines are very useful. They report on your postage costs so the company can claim their full expenses on their tax return.
For companies wishing to keep track of postage across departments, then most franking machines allow for multiple department accounts to be set up and reported on. This can help keep control of costs.
