National Change of Address (NCOA)

Over 40 million Americans change addresses annually, which creates formidable obstacles in maintaining a high-quality mailing list that tracks customers who move. The National Change of Address (NCOA) program makes change-of-address (COA) information available to mailers to help reduce undeliverable or duplicate mail pieces. NCOA service is a comprehensive program that aids mailers in identifying changes of addresses before mail enters the mail stream.

Trylon can provide NCOA service to you, whether as part of a merge/purge or while preparing any mail file. In addition, Trylon can provide importable files that can be used to directly update your own database, including Raiser’s Edge.

Input address information provided by a mailer to Trylon is first standardized to conform to USPS requirements, including the ZIP+4 code.Once the address has been standardized and the ZIP+4 code applied, an attempt is made to match the address against the NCOA File, which contains approximately 152 million records or 48 months of permanent address changes. Address change information is derived from the PS Form 3575, Change-of-Address Order, filed by relocating postal customers. If an exact match is made with the old address information in the NCOA File, then the NCOA process provides the move information (new address) to the mailer.

NCOA helps reduce undeliverable-as-addressed mail by correcting input addresses prior to mailing. Since 1986, this service has saved mailers millions of dollars that otherwise would have been wasted in materials and postage.

NCOA provides the following benefits to mailers:

• Reduces undeliverable mail by providing the most current address information for matches made to the NCOA File.
• Prevents duplicate mail pieces or re-mailings after address corrections are received because the address correction is applied prior to the mailing.
• Reduces mailer costs by reducing the number of undeliverable and duplicate mail pieces by using most current address information.
• Provides the opportunity for faster product/service marketing through accurate mail delivery.

Mailers can cleanse their mailing lists further by using the Nixie option. Nixie returns a code indicating a match was close but not good enough to meet the strict USPS matching guidelines. The nixie code indicates the reason a match could not be made with the NCOA file, and a mailer can investigate the address record and provide necessary corrections. A no-match to the NCOA file does NOT return the new address - the Nixie Option indicates why.

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