Preparing files properly to go through Acorn's preflight process with flying colors requires care and consideration in the construction of the file. That same care needs to go into the file that you send to us to process your mailing efficiently and without incurring additional costs.
   There are many different programs and preferences that end-users have to create a mailing list. When you are creating your records, it is imperative that you break out the fields correctly and consistently. The fields should be:

n First Name*
n Last Name*
n Address
n City
n State
n Zip
* These two fields can be combined, but it will limit our capabilities to delete dupes at a later time.

   Consistency is important. If you have an address that requires two lines, all addresses need to accommodate the second line. If the mailing program is set up for 4 lines and it comes across a record with 3 lines, information will be re-allocated to different fields causing that label to print out incorrectly. Other suggestions are:
n The list should be prepared in a PC rather than a Macintosh format.
n Make sure post office boxes are used when appropriate, rather than street addresses.
n Use only standard abbreviations (such as Rd. and Dr. for "Road" and "Drive"), rather than abbreviations you create.		    Since there are different programs used to create these mailing files, we need a way to make your file compatible with our system. To accomplish that, we suggest that you do a "Save As" from your program and choose "CSV/(Comma delimited)". This will create an ASCII file with  "   qualifiers and commas separating fields. The mailing program template will then put everything where it belongs. Other acceptable formats would be dBase 4, ASCII tab-delimited or ASCII fixed length (we need the length of each field).
   These files can then be sent to us on a DOS formatted floppy disk, zip disk or CD. You can also choose to put the file on our FTP site or send it as an attachment via e-mail.