What is a No-Stat Address?

The result code AS17 indicates a no-stat address in several of Melissa’s products, including our flagship on-premise Address Object as well as our cloud Personator Consumer service and our Global Address service. The USPS considers no-stats as inactive addresses that are unlikely to receive mail. Sending mail to an inactive address costs valuable time and money. But what is an inactive address, and why is it unlikely to receive mail?

Let’s review some possible scenarios.

The USPS can consider an address a no-stat for several reasons. These include:

• The address is in a rural area, the customer uses a P.O. box and the USPS does not directly deliver to the address.
• The address is a part of new growth, like a newly built, unoccupied residence or business.
• The address is in an area where the USPS does not deliver mail to individual units or buildings but to a designated, communal mail drop location.

What happens to the mail?

It’s rare that mail is delivered to a no-stat address. Postal workers in large or urban locations use automated mail sorting, which will return it to the sender. In smaller towns and rural areas, mail might be delivered to the no-stat address if the USPS employee has a better understanding of the layout and population.

Alternatively, third party carriers can be a way to get this mail delivered. Anecdotally, we do hear of cases where an address is flagged as No-Stat but is still able to receive mail from delivery companies like UPS or FedEx. The success will depend on the internal rules as well as customer data that these third-party companies have in house. They may have an easier time overriding the no-stat indicator than the USPS.

Changing a No-Stat

To change your address from a no-stat status, contact your local post office or, to speed up the process, visit the Address Management System Office Locator to find the nearest AMS.

What does a No-Stat mean for mailers?

Avoiding returned delivery is vital to a successful mailing campaign. Save resources, time, and reputation by filtering out these addresses that physically exist but are undeliverable by mail. This is a crucial part of the address cleansing process and qualifying for discounts.

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At Melissa, we’ve leveraged 38 years of address verification expertise to give you the best possible products. Learn more from our collection of Address Experts articles.