arizona republicwed, november 3, 1999
page E1
Postal Service says label fights fraud;
small firms cry foul
By Jane Larson
The Arizona Republic
PMB - - three simple letters that will help prevent mail fraud, or a red flag that will smear small and home-based businesses as less than legal?
The U.S. Postal Service, the mailbox rental industry and small business advocates have been wrangling for months over proposed regulations that would require mailbox holders to add the designation "PMB" to their addresses.
The designation - for private mail box - was announced in April, scheduled to go into effect last month, then postponed until April. Now the Postal Service is preparing to publish regulations this month that would allow boxholders to use either PMB or the # sign in their addresses - but not " Suite ... .. Apartment ... .. Department" or other potentially misleading terms. Whether current users would be grandfathered in is still being discussed.
But the idea of a PMB designation has some small- business owners feeling discriminated against.
"It makes us look less credible, because it says, 'Ha, ha, they have a mailbox and not their own office,' " said Phyllis Van
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