[Federal Register Volume 59, Number 47 (Thursday, March 10, 1994)] [Unknown Section] [Page 0] From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov] [FR Doc No: 94-5428] [[Page Unknown]] [Federal Register: March 10, 1994] ======================================================================= ----------------------------------------------------------------------- POSTAL SERVICE 39 CFR Part 20 Amendment of International Mail Manual Subchapter 790 AGENCY: Postal Service. ACTION: Final rule. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY: The Postal Service is adopting amendments of International Mail Manual Subchapter 790 to clarify when a mailing in a foreign country is by or on behalf of a United States resident for purposes of collecting United States domestic postage and to authorize the collection of United States domestic postage on certain mail posted in a foreign country by or on behalf of persons who do not reside in that country. EFFECTIVE DATE: 12:01 a.m., March 10, 1994. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Walter J. Grandjean, (202) 268-5180. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On April 28, 1993, the Postal Service published in the Federal Register (58 FR 25959) a proposed rule that would amend Subchapter 790 of the International Mail Manual to clarify when mail is posted in a foreign country is by or on behalf of a United States resident (ABA remail) for purposes of collecting United States domestic postage. The proposed rule would also authorize the Postal Service to collect United States domestic postage on certain mailings posted in countries with which the Postal Service has not negotiated cost-based terminal dues arrangements by or on behalf of persons who reside in countries with which the Postal Service has negotiated cost- based terminal dues arrangements (ABC remail). The Post Service proposed a broad definition of United States resident that would allow it to collect United States domestic postage on mailings posted in another country not only by firms or entities organized in the United States, but also by firms or entities organized under the laws of other countries when there was a substantial connection between such firms or entities and individuals or firms in the United States. The Postal Service also proposed to define when a mailing was by or on behalf of a United States resident as those mailings in which a United States resident seeks or expects to receive an economic advantage. The Postal Service also proposed a definition of resident of a country with which the Postal Service has cost-based terminal dues arrangements and a definition of when a mailing was by or on behalf of such a resident. Comments were due on or before June 1, 1993, and ten comments were received by that date. Of those comments, six opposed and four supported the proposed rule. In view of the comments, the Postal Service has decided to adopt the proposed rule with amendments to take into account some of the criticisms of the proposal. Legal Authority One commenter, an association of companies that compete with the Postal Service, asserts that this rulemaking violates the separation of powers and due process principles of the Constitution because the rule would regulate companies that compete with the Postal Service. The Postal Service disagrees. The commenter cited no cases or other authority to support its assertion, and the Postal Service is not aware of any authority which would support such an assertion. Moreover, the rule does not regulate competitors of the Postal Service who do not use the Postal Service's services, but only specifies when mailers must pay U.S. domestic postage to secure delivery of their mail. Mailers can continue to use remailers and can deposit their mail in any country they choose. They will be required, however, to pay the full cost of the services they obtain from the Postal Service. Two commenters, a competitor of the Postal Service and the association of competitors, assert that the proposed rule violates the Postal Reorganization Act because it would extend the application of the Private Express Statutes beyond the United States and to mailable matter other than letters. These commenters also assert that the proposed rule would either impose the Postal Service's bilateral cost- based terminal dues arrangements on third countries or boycott mail from non-cost-based terminal dues countries unless the mailer agreed to pay United States domestic postage. They further assert that the Postal Service is not authorized to adopt an interpretation of the Universal Postal Convention without the approval of the President. The Postal Service disagrees. The proposed rule would not extend the territorial reach of the Private Express Statutes. The Private Express Statutes, 18 U.S.C. 1694- 99, 39 U.S.C. 601-06, generally prohibit the private carriage of letters on post routes without paying postage. There are exceptions to this prohibition, and the Postal Service has suspended the prohibition in some cases, e.g., for extremely urgent letters and for outbound international remail. 39 CFR 320.6, 320.8. The proposed rule would not require that anything be sent by mail, or that United States postage be paid on non-letter mail sent by a private carrier. It simply prescribes when United States postage must be paid to the Postal Service when the mailer chooses to use the Postal Service to deliver items in the United States. Mailers are free, subject to the internal legislation of the countries where they are, to use any carrier they want for both letter and non-letter mailable matter. The Private Express Statutes would come into play only when a mailer chooses to send letters to the United States via a private carrier. When those letters arrive in the United States, unless they come within an exception or suspension of the Statutes, they must be entered into the mails or have United States postage affixed. That is entirely different from the requirement in this rule that U.S. domestic postage be paid on matter entering the United States through the international mail system and which is tendered to the Postal Service for delivery by choice. The proposed rule would not impose bilateral terminal dues arrangements on third countries nor would it constitute a boycott of mail from countries with which the Postal Service does not have cost- based terminal dues arrangements. The rule does not alter the terms under which the Postal Service exchanges mail with any other country. Countries that are part of the UPU terminal dues system will continue to pay UPU terminal dues. Mail from those countries will continue to be accepted and processed, except for mail posted by or on behalf of mailers who reside in the United States or one of the countries with which the Postal Service has cost-based terminal dues arrangements. That mail will be held for postage or returned as authorized by Article 25 of the Universal Postal Convention (Washington 1989). The Postal Service is not required to obtain the approval of the President to adopt this rule. Section 407 of title 39, United States Code, provides in pertinent part, ``The decisions of the Postal Service construing or interpreting the provisions of any treaty or convention which has been or may be negotiated and concluded shall, if approved by the President, be conclusive on all officers of the Government of the United States.'' This provision does not limit the authority to adopt regulations, 39 U.S.C. 401(2), but establishes the conditions under which any interpretation of a postal convention will be binding on all officers of the Government. Indeed, the absence of Presidential approval does not make the Postal Service's interpretation invalid, it merely leaves open the possibility that there might be a disagreement with some other interested agency. Presidential approval simply provides a mechanism for resolving disagreements in favor of the Postal Service. One commenter asserted that the proposed rule would impermissibly extend the territorial jurisdiction of the Postal Service and could cause conflicts between it and the internal legislation of other countries in which mailers are present. The Postal Service disagrees. The basis of the proposed rule is Article 25 of the Universal Postal Convention. That article authorizes postal administrations to collect domestic postage on certain international mail and the decline to deliver certain international mail. Thus, the proposed rule is not based on domestic law alone, but is based on an international agreement to which virtually all countries adhere. That is far different from the case of purporting to apply domestic legislation to conduct outside the United States. That the Postal Service has decided to apply Article 25 selectively to avoid interference with mailers' decisions which do not adversely affect it does not change the application of Article 25 into an extraterritorial extension of United States jurisdiction. One commenter asserts that the proposed rule exceeds the authority given by Article 25 because the proposed rule would allow the Postal Service to collect domestic postage on remail posted in a country other than the country where the mailer resides, and Article 25 provides only that postal administrations ``shall not be bound to accept, forward, or deliver'' such mail and ``may send back such items to origin or return them to the senders without repaying the prepaid charge.'' This comment is accurate insofar as there is no express authorization to collect domestic postage on ABC remail as there is for ABA remail. However, the Postal Service does not believe that the absence of an express authorization precludes it from providing mailers an alternative that can be much less onerous than returning the mail to origin. The purpose of Article 25 and IMM 790 is not to punish remail per se, or for that matter, disrupt commercial activities via the mails. As viewed by the Postal Service, Article 25 is intended to ensure that postal administrations receive appropriate compensation for the services they render. Returning mail to origin can take time, and the mail being returned may be time sensitive. The mailer may also have invested more in a mailing than the postage that has been or will have to be paid. In these cases, the option of securing delivery by paying United States domestic postage can be much more desirable than incurring the expense of waiting for the mail to come back, preparing the mail for posting in a third country, and paying new postage to a third postal administration. Moreover, since United States domestic postage rates are among the lowest in the world, there is some likelihood that the mail would simply come back to the United States prepared as United States mail. This being the case, there appears to be no good reason to require mailers to incur the additional expense of re-preparing the mail, shipping it to the United States or some other country, and then paying new postage. One commenter asserts that the proposed rule would be a repudiation of the Universal Postal Convention's basic terminal dues arrangements. The Postal Service disagrees. The Convention contains both terminal dues provisions and Article 25 which authorizes administrations not to accept or deliver ABA or ABC remail. As both those provisions are in the Convention, they must be understood as being consistent with one another. In this respect, the existence of Article 25 is a recognition that terminal dues arrangements that are appropriate, and even essential, for the efficient exchange of mails between many countries can be unfairly exploited for individual gain. Enforcement of Article 25 is not a repudiation of the terminal dues system, it is a recognition of a vulnerability that permits administrations to protect themselves and their customers from unfair exploitation. One commenter asserts that the Postal Service is not exempt from the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) and that the Supreme Court has rejected the Postal Service's claim to be exempt from the APA. The Postal Service disagrees. Section 410 of title 39, United States Code, provides expressly that ``Except as provided by subsection (b) of this section, and except as otherwise provided in this title * * * no Federal law dealing with public or Federal contracts, property, works, officers, employees, budgets, or funds, including the provisions of chapters 5 and 7 of title 5, shall apply to the exercise of the powers of the Postal Service.'' 39 U.S.C. 410(a). This language plainly exempts the Postal Service from the APA, which is in chapters 5 and 7 of title 5. In subsection (b) of section 410, only sections 552 (public information), 552a (records about individuals), 552b (open meetings) of title 5 are made applicable. Elsewhere in title 39, only section 3001 makes the APA applicable to the Postal Service and then only for mailability proceedings. Thus, nothing in the statute makes the APA applicable to this rulemaking. As for the Supreme Court, in the case mentioned by the commenter, Air Courier Conference of America v. American Postal Workers Union, the Court did not rule on the merits of whether the Postal Service was subject to the APA, but refused to consider an argument based on exemption from the APA because that argument had not been presented to the court below. Not considering an argument is far different from considering an argument and rejecting it. Definition of United States Resident and of Other Country Resident Several commenters assert that the proposed rule, insofar as it attempts to elaborate criteria for determining whether a firm or business is resident in the United States in terms of the percentage of ownership of that firm or business by persons who reside in the United States or by other firms or organizations incorporated or organized in the United States, is unreasonable and that it is too broad and could result in legitimate international mailings having to pay twice or having to pay a different compensation rate than the one they are entitled to under the Universal Postal (UPU) Convention. They further assert that it is ambiguous, that it would require a knowledge of corporate information which would be too burdensome for a foreign private carrier or postal administration to ascertain, that it would have adverse consequences operationally and for customers, that efforts to apply the rule will lead to arbitrary actions and disputes, and that it would erect a trade barrier. Similar objections are raised regarding the application of such percentage of ownership criteria to determine the resident status of a sender in another country. In response to these views, the Postal Service is eliminating the percentage of ownership criteria from its proposed rulemaking. Trade Policy Two commenters have asserted that the proposed rule is contrary to U.S. trade interests and anti-competitive and that the European Commission has recently started proceedings against enforcement of Article 25. One of the commenters has asserted that Article 25 itself is an anti-competitive, market-allocation scheme. The Postal Service does not agree with these assertions. These commenters have also asserted that President Reagan had instructed the Postal Service not to apply UPU Convention Article 25(4) in an anti-competitive manner. The Postal Service does not consider the proposed rule to be inconsistent with the position President Reagan communicated to the Postal Service or to be anti-competitive. First, the Postal Service sees no inconsistency between U.S. trade interests and its own efforts to assure that it is fairly and adequately compensated for the costs of handling mail from other countries. It would not agree with the implication that remail companies, which target a specific, high- density type of mailing for their services, are entitled to subsidized, below-cost delivery of their mailings by postal administrations or that efforts to assure adequate compensation for the cost of delivery of such mailings are anti-competitive. To the extent that remail companies depend upon such below-cost delivery for the services they offer, they are engaged in an abuse of the international mail system and of U.S. mailers whose payments in effect subsidize such services. Article 25 permits postal administrations to take action which, rather than being anti-competitive, serves to protect themselves against such abuse. To the extent that private carriers provide end-to-end delivery services, Article 25 simply does not apply to their activities. Furthermore, the contention that the European Commission is proceeding against enforcement of Article 25 is ambiguous. The manner in which actions were taken by some European administrations in the past has been challenged by the European Commission. However, there are postal administrations in Europe, such as the German postal administration, which are now aggressively applying Article 25 and these actions are not being challenged by the European Commission. Improvements in the Terminal Dues System Three commenters assert that the Postal Service should deal with the problem of uneconomic remail by correcting the flaws of the UPU terminal dues system instead of taking administrative action. The Postal Service agrees that the best way of dealing with uneconomic remail would be to correct the flaws of the terminal dues system, but it has concerns about whether the 186 member countries of the Universal Postal Union, many of which have a vested interest in the current structure, can agree on a system that will adequately solve the problem. The Postal Service is, nevertheless, working to establish a fully cost-based terminal dues system, that is, a system to cover the specific costs of each delivering postal administration which agrees to participate in the new system, thus providing fair and equal reimbursement for delivery services regardless of where mail is entered in the new system by participating administrations. Fewer than thirty industrialized countries, however, have an interest in developing such a system. Although these countries have made progress in achieving consensus on the requirements for and operation of such a system, the problem of ``unequal access'' is likely to be exacerbated. The majority of countries which will continue to apply a simplified, lower-rate UPU system in all their mail exchanges will have more favorable access to the industrialized countries participating in the cost-based system than the industrialized countries will have with each other. To permit a new country-specific cost-based system to operate equitably and without the unfair arbitrage experienced between the current cost-related system and the UPU terminal dues system would require a majority of the member countries of the Universal Postal Union to agree either to a global country-specific cost-based terminal dues system or to an interface or ``bridge'' arrangement between the simpler UPU terminal dues system and the country-specific cost-based system. In considering the difficulties of persuading the UPU of the market-influenced reasons for cost-based terminal dues, it should be noted that a majority of UPU member countries, many of which are developing countries, would lose significant terminal dues revenues under a country-specific cost-based system which would require payment of higher prices for delivery services to the industrialized countries and lower prices for the same services to approximately 160 other countries. Despite the obstacles, the Postal Service is working toward the adoption at UPU Congress of proposals which, if approved, will significantly reduce the flaws in the current terminal dues system. Although the Postal Service is optimistic about the adoption of some of these proposals, it has only one of approximately 186 votes at UPU Congress and cannot guarantee the outcome. Furthermore, the Postal Service is obligated to comply with the terms of the Acts of the Universal Postal Union currently in effect. Outside of the framework of these Acts, the Postal Service can negotiate other terminal dues arrangements only with the agreement of another country or group of countries; it cannot impose a particular cost-based terminal dues arrangement on other countries nor can it unilaterally impose a particular level of terminal dues on inbound international mail. The UPU meets in Congress every five years, and the next opportunity to achieve the agreement necessary to implement an equitable and fully cost-based terminal dues system among the industrialized countries will arise at the Seoul Congress in late 1994. The Acts of the Universal Postal Union adopted at that Congress will take effect in 1996. In the meantime, therefore, the application of the proposed rule is the only means of providing protection against the abuse of the current terminal dues system. Administration of Proposed Rule One commenter asserted that enforcement of the rule is bound to be arbitrary and capricious, that it cannot be strictly enforced without incurring excessive costs, and that, if selectively enforced, it would be enforced only against competitors of the Postal Service. The Postal Service disagrees with this assertion. The elimination of the criteria for determining resident status which relates to percentage of ownership will simplify enforcement activity. Although excessive costs might be incurred if one-hundred percent effectiveness were required, enforcement can still be undertaken in a sufficiently vigorous and cost-effective manner to maintain a credible deterrent to abuse of the system. Furthermore, the effort to distinguish so-called competitors from non-competitors engaged in efforts to evade fair payment of delivery costs would, even if it were possible, certainly lead to excessive administrative costs and be self-defeating. As the purpose of the rule is solely to assure fair and adequate reimbursement of delivery costs, there is no incentive to make such an effort. One commenter asserts that there has been no independent verification that UPU terminal dues do not adequately compensate the Postal Service for its expense in delivering foreign-origin mail and that participation in a study of international costs and revenues by the Postal Rate Commission should be a prerequisite to implementing the proposed rule. The Postal Service disagrees. The Postal Service alone is responsible international mail services, and there is no legal requirement that its determinations be subject to verification by any other agency. The Postal Rate Commission, in particular, has no jurisdiction over international rates or services, so any study conducted by the Commission would have no legal significance. The Postal Service has concluded that the proposed rule, as amended, would benefit users of United States mail. No persuasive reason has been put forward why implementation of that rule should be deferred while an agency with no responsibility for international services conducts a cost study that would have no legal significance. Accordingly, the Postal Service will not defer implementation of the proposed rule. One commenter asserts that the Postal Service has offered no data on the losses against which the proposed rule would provide protection and no support of the need for such a rulemaking. The assertion that the Postal Service has not attempted to precisely quantify all losses is correct as far as it goes. However, based upon mailings already found to be in violation of Subchapter 790 and upon the continuing nature of these activities, the Postal Service considers that it has an adequate basis for its estimate that it has already suffered significant losses and for its judgment that it will continue to incur such losses unless more effective remedial action is taken. Therefore, by giving the sender the option of either paying domestic postage to secure delivery or accepting their return to origin, such losses can be avoided or significantly reduced. One commenter asserted that, under the proposed rule, the Postal Service could decide at its own discretion whether mail was of legitimate international origin or whether it should have been entered as domestic mail and that it could make such decisions without prior consultation with regulators, other postal administrations, or other administrative bodies. The Postal Service agrees that it will exercise its own discretion in implementing the proposed rule, but disagrees with any implication that this will be done in an arbitrary manner and without opportunity for consultation. The Postal Service considers the exercise of this responsibility to be fully consistent with its statutory authority and responsibility to assure that it is appropriately and adequately compensated for the costs of the services it provides. The purpose of the proposed rule is to provide senders and foreign postal administrations with information about Postal Service enforcement activities which will help assure that mailings comply with Postal Service regulations and are not subject to such decisions. It is the responsibility of the sender to be informed about these regulations and to comply with them. The elimination of the percentage of ownership criteria should simplify compliance with these Postal Service regulations. If the sender or a foreign postal administration remains uncertain about whether a mailing complies with Postal Service regulations, then it is the responsibility of the sender or the foreign postal administration to consult with the Postal Service in advance of the mailing. In any event, when the Postal Service determines that it is appropriate to apply the proposed rule, it will attempt to consult with the sender and to give the sender an opportunity to pay the required domestic postage or to explain why the mailing should be delivered without such payment. The sending administration will then also have an opportunity to comment on the enforcement of the rule by the Postal Service. One commenter asserts that the proposed rule is inconsistent with the policy of allowing outbound remail from the United States, that it would deny to foreign firms the opportunities for remail to the United States that the Postal Service allows to firms in the United States, that it does not take into account remailing opportunities to the United States ``between countries not listed in Exhibit 792.1,'' that, if adopted by other countries, the rule would eliminate the possibility of sending ``prepaid mailshots'' from the country of choice of the sender, and that the proposed ruling would disturb the climate for establishing cost-based terminal dues. The Postal Service disagrees with these assertions, at least to the extent that they refer to mailings for which the country of destination will be adequately compensated for its delivery costs. It is true that the suspension of the Private Express Statutes for outbound international mail will permit private delivery services, including remail companies, to carry mail to other countries without Postal Service constraint. In such circumstances, however, the Postal Service itself incurs no costs and suffers no cost disadvantage. The purpose of the proposed rule is to provide protection only in those circumstances where the Postal Service does incur costs and would suffer a cost disadvantage. Furthermore, the fact that Postal Service has suspended its own Private Express Statutes with respect to outbound international mail does not mean that private delivery services or remail companies are not subject to the corresponding statutes of other countries or to the actions which other postal administrations may take to enforce Article 25 or to assure adequate compensation for the delivery of mail from senders in the United States sent indirectly by way of third countries providing access to the international mail system at below-cost postage rates. With respect to remail opportunities to the United States ``between countries not listed in Exhibit 792.1,'' as long as the sender is a resident of such a country, the Postal Service suffers no cost disadvantage for such mailings. With respect to the threat to ``prepaid mailshots'' from the country of choice of the sender, there is no threat to ``prepaid mailshots'' as long as there has been no evasion of the payment to the delivering country of appropriate postage rates or terminal dues. With respect to the assertion that the proposed rule would disturb the climate for establishing cost-based terminal dues, the Postal Service is of the view that such a rule vigorously enforced will strengthen the incentive to adopt a cost-based terminal dues system in order to reduce the need for such enforcement activity. One commenter suggested what he considered to be clarifying changes to sections 792.31 and 792.32 of the proposed rule, which explain that a mailing is ``by or on behalf of a person or firm who resides in the United States'' or ``by or on behalf of a person or firm who resides in a country listed in Exhibit 792.1'' where ``such a person or firm seeks or expects to derive economic benefit or advantage from that mailing'' in relation to activities or to ``operations physically conducted'' in the United States or in one of the countries listed in Exhibit 792.1. The commenter suggested the addition of ``with respect to the cost of postage'' after ``if such a person seeks or expects to derive economic benefit or advantage from that mailing'' to clarify that the economic benefit is with respect to the cost of the postage for the mailing and not because of the content of the mailing. The Postal Service has not adopted this suggestion because the ``economic benefit or advantage'' noted in Sec. 792.31 and 792.32 refers to the gains which are the result of the addressees response to the mailings expected by the person or firm engaged in the mailing and not gain which result from avoiding the cost of postage. The Postal Service adopts the following amendments to the International Mail Manual, which is incorporated by reference in the Code of Federal Regulations. See 39 CFR 20.1. List of Subjects in 39 CFR Part 20 Foreign relations, international postal services. PART 20--[AMENDED] 1. The authority citation for 39 CFR part 20 continues to read as follows: Authority: 5 U.S.C. 552(a); 39 U.S.C. 401, 404, 407, 408. 2. Chapter 7 of the International Mail Manual is amended by revising section 790 to read as follows: CHAPTER 7--TREATMENT OF INBOUND MAIL * * * * * 790 Items Mailed Abroad by or on Behalf of Senders in the U.S. and Certain Other Countries. 791 Postage Payment Required. Payment of United States postage is required to secure delivery of mail described in 792 under the following circumstances: a. The mailing is by or on behalf of a person or firm that resides in the United States and the foreign rate of postage applied to such items is lower than the comparable United States domestic rate of postage, or 1000 or more such items are mailed in a 30 day period regardless of whether the foreign postage is lower than the comparable United States postage; or b. The mailing is by or on behalf of a person or firm that resides in a country listed in Exhibit 792.1, is posted in a country not listed in Exhibit 792.1, and 1000 or more items are mailed in a 30 day period. 792 Mailings Affected. 792.1 Special Conditions. The special conditions apply to items of mail which are posted in foreign countries: a. By or on behalf of persons or firms who reside in the United States; or b. By or on behalf of persons or firms who reside in one of the countries listed in Exhibit 792.1. 792.2 Residency 792.21 Criteria for U.S. Residency. A firm is a resident of the United States if it meets the following criteria: a. It has a place of business in the United States; or b. It is incorporated or otherwise in the United States, its territories, or possessions. 792.22 Criteria for Countries Listed in Exhibit 792.1 A firm is a resident of a country listed in Exhibit 792.1 if it meets the following criteria: a. It has its principal place of business in that country; or b. It is incorporated or otherwise in that country, its territories or possessions. 792.3 By or on Behalf 792.31 United States Resident. A mailing is by or on behalf of a person or firm who resides in the United States if such a person or firm seeks or expects to derive economic benefit or advantage from that mailing. 792.32 Resident of a County Listed in Exhibit 972.1. A mailing is by or on behalf of a person or firm who resides in a country listed in Exhibit 792.1 if such a person or firm seeks or expects to derive economic benefit or advantage from that mailing related to operations physically conducted in any of those countries. These operations include, but are not limited to, selling goods manufactured in those countries and selling services provided in those countries. 792.4 Place of Business. A place of business in the United States is any location in the United States, its territories, or possessions where a firm's employees or agents regulatory have personal contact with other individuals for the purpose of conducting the firm's business. For the purposes of this section, a firm whose employees or agents have personal contact with others for the purpose of conducting the firm's business in different places in the United States for short periods of time, e.g., at hotels in different cities for one or two days at a time, has a place of business in the United States if the aggregate amount of time spent in the United States is 180 days or more during a one year period. 792.5 Agents. The use of a non-exclusive agent in the United States for the sole purposes of accepting orders and remissions for transmission to a firm in another country or of distributing merchandise manufactured in another country and shipped to the United States in bulk does not by itself constitute establishment of a place in the United States. 793 Advance Payment Required. 793.1 Sample of Envelope. Senders affected by 791 must submit a sample of the proposed mailing (envelope and contents) with (1) a statement as to the number of items to be mailed, (2) when and where the mailing will take place, and (3) a check, made payable to the U.S. Postal Service, to cover the amount of the applicable U.S. postage, to the: Manager, Business Mail Acceptance, Customer Service and Sales, U.S. Postal Service, 475 L'Enfant Plaza SW., Washington, DC 20260-6808. 793.2 Headquarters Notification. Notification of postage acceptance and approval of the mailing will be given by Headquarters to the sender and to the appropriate U.S. receiving exchange office. This will permit the items in the mailing to go forward to the addresses without delay when the items reach the United States. 794 Treatment if Advance Payment Not Made. 794.1 Return or Disposal of Items. Items may be returned to origin or disposed of in accordance with postal regulations if U.S. postage is not paid. 794.2 Mailings Received Without Advance Payment. A mailing subject to 791 received without advance payment of U.S. domestic postage will be held at the receiving exchange office. The exchange office will report all such mailings to the: Manager, Business Mail Acceptance, Customer Service and Sales, U.S. Postal Service, 475 L'Enfant Plaza SW., Washington, DC 20260-6808. Reports must contain (1) title and/or nature of the items, (2) identity of sender, (3) number of items detained, (4) weight of a single item, (5) foreign postage paid per item, and (6) office of mailing. The exchange office will be advised to release the mail when the applicable postage has been paid. 795 Report of Mailings. Any mail appearing to be subject to the conditions of this subchapter must be reported to Business Mail Acceptance, at USPS Headquarters, by the U.S. receiving exchange office. Exhibit 792.1 Canada Denmark Finland France Germany Great Britain and Northern Ireland Iceland Ireland Italy Luxembourg Netherlands Norway Spain Sweden Stanley F. Mires, Chief Counsel, Legislative. [FR Doc. 94-5428 Filed 3-9-94; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7710-12-M
