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Pearland POSTAL PLUS offers a 10% discount on USPS - PRIORITY MAIL for overseas shipments to active military APO/FPO/DPO locations. (10% discount applies to all shipping costs including boxes / packaging / taping and postage).
What is an APO / FPO / DPO address?
Guide to Overseas Military Mail:
The concept of getting mail overseas to and from military personnel
stationed overseas is a priority for many family and friends of our
military men and women in the armed services overseas. In
formalizing this activity, the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) and the
Department of Defense (DoD) negotiated an agreement called Overseas
Military Mail. In this agreement addressing schemes, delivery
mechanisms and nomenclature were hammered out.
Here is how Overseas Military Mail really works:
The USPS has formalized a standard addressing scheme for all
domestic mail. Many will of course recognize this as:
- Name
- Street Number
- City, State, ZIP
- Name
- P.O. Box
- City, State, ZIP
- Name
- Rural Delivery
- City, State, ZIP
In order to make Military Mail conform to this scheme, several things were created. These were:
Three Military "States":
- AA, which stands for Armed Forces (the) Americas
- AE, which stands for Armed Forces Europe
- AP, which stands for Armed Forces Pacific
Three "City" equivalents:
- APO, which stands for Army Post Office
- FPO, which stands for Fleet Post Office
- DPO, which stands for Diplomatic Post Office
Based on these constructs, a typical Overseas Military Mail address looks like this:
- Name
- Address
- APO, AP ZIP
- Name
- Postal Service Center + Identifier
- FPO, AP ZIP
By having all Overseas Military Mail conform to the domestic mailing addressing scheme, the USPS could easily sort and manage it using their sophisticated sorting and distribution machines, just like regular mail.
But there is more to these constructs than addressing schemes. The Military State designators mean more than "phantom" states. They represent the USPS mail processing facilities that handle the mail traffic to and from each Military State. These locations, the USPS mail processing facilities themselves, are located in cities that are conducive to getting mail to and from the overseas region of the respective Military State. These Military State/City pairs are:
- AA : Miami, FL
- AE : New York, NY
- AP : San Francisco, CA
Since these cities already had ZIP codes assigned to them, it was
decided to have the ZIP codes of the respective Military State be
numerically close to the ZIP code of the city where the mail
processing facility is located. This allowed the USPS automated
sorting equipment to funnel the Military Mail to the proper city
where the respective mail processing facility is located.
Once the Military Mail arrives at the respective mail processing facility, it is further sorted by Postal Service Center, APO/FPO/DPO and ZIP code. After that, the USPS "hands it off" to their Military equivalent in a branch of the Armed Forces after transport via contract air carrier and delivery to the overseas APOs, FPOs, and APOs. For APOs and DPOs, either the Army or Air Force provides personnel. For FPOs, the Navy does the job.
At each APO, FPO, or DPO, there is an equivalent to "a-real-honest-to-goodness-Post Office" staffed by members of the respective branch of service. While the layout of each APO/FPO/DPO varies by location, suffice it to say they look and operate just like a "real" Post Office. In fact, they have to, since we are talking about U.S. Mail. Each APO/FPO/DPO address holder has a mail lock box in which their mail is slotted. Since parcels can't fit in these boxes, delivery or notification slips, just like "real" ones, are put in the boxes whenever a parcel arrives.
Outbound mail from APOs/FPOs/DPOs flows in the reverse of the process described above, with the mail passing through the "neck", the mail processing facility for the respective Military State, to enter into the normal USPS sorting and delivery system.
As can been seen, APOs, FPOs, and DPOs are just like the Post Office
(P.O.) boxes one can rent at the local Post Office. The only real
difference being is that they are located overseas on Military bases
or in U.S. Embassies. So simply put, while valid domestic mailing
addresses, APO/FPO/DPO addresses are not street or physical
addresses; they never were and never will be.
So, with the establishment of the Overseas Military Mail program, three Military States (AA,AE,AP) and three city equivalents (APO, FPO, DPO) were created, along with a specific set of ZIP codes for each Military State. Once these constructs are understood, as well as the flow of packages to and through the mail processing facilities (located in Miami, New York, and San Francisco) which represent the Military States, it is it is easy to see how confusing all of this can be.
But now that Military Mail has been explained, it's no longer a mystery. Better yet, now that you understand it, you can get it working for you. Just stop by Pearland POSTAL PLUS and we will help you package and ship your personal care package to your loved one serving at an APO/FPO/DPO address overseas.
Shipping Schedules
SHIPPING (CUT_OFF) TIMES
Fedex Air Pickup Times
Monday - Friday 5:00 pm
Saturday Noon
FedEx Ground pickup times:
Monday - Friday 4:30 pm
UPS Air pickup times:
Monday - Friday 5:45 pm
Saturday No Pickup
UPS Ground pickup times:
Monday- Friday 5:45 pm
Saturday No Pickup
DHL Intl pickup times:
Monday - Friday 3:00 pm
Saturday No Pickup
USPS pick up times:
Monday - Saturday Daily Pickup
HomePearland Postal Plus stocks the following items. We also have specialtiy packages for some fragile devices such as Laptops. These items are for sale in our store at 8325 Broadway,Suite 202 Pearland Texas 77581.