Franking Machine or Hybrid Mail

[Jawaid Karim]

Not sure if this is the right place for this, but here goes.....

I am in the process of starting to send mailshots to new companies that have just been registered, who may not have an email address, so need to use the good old postal system. I have been looking at the options available, namely getting a Franking Machine or use an online Hybrid Mail service.

Both have their pros & cons, but at the moment I can't decide for one or the other. Just wondered what other small businesses are using and would welcome suggestions.

If you are using one or the other, which one are you using and how has your experience been,

 

[Mark T Jones]

Have you looked at using a mailing house?

 

[IanSuth]

In days of yonder we owned a franking machine and that was fine, we just topped up the credit as and when. Then Pitney Bowes said as we had to have an internet connected franking machine we couldn't do that anymore, we had to lease one, so we did. And it had an inkjet printer instead of the old pad&stamper mechanics of the old one. It got through inkcartridges at a rate of knots and you were meant to use their stickers, both of which were £

so about 10 years ago we went back to buying stamps (you can get them in bulk from places like Costco) as it worked out cheaper with the volumes we were doing (only a few a day and dropping all the time).

Now I believe you have to print with barcodes as well - if you are based near any form of post office which is i open when you need it to be then I would go ask them in person for their cost carrying a sample mailing. If you have a lot (100 a week) then maybe a mailing house or a franking machine but not if lesss

 

[chickenlady]

If you are initially sending relatively small numbers (under 1000) irregularly, not time sensitive and they are printed inhouse, you could look at Whistl - they do a service through Parcel2Go under the 'Letters and Small Parcels' tab which ultimately uses Royal Mail but more cheaply. Otherwise Whistl needs big numbers to go to them directly.
If you have an RM business account, they can do printing and processing for 1000+ but a mailing house may be cheaper - its a while since I've done over 1000.

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Are Pitney Bowles still going

I might send them a mail shot

 

[Bob Morgan]

My Franking Machine is in the garden shed, filed with sheets of Letraset, a VCR, and a Dansette!