If you use Semaphore Corporation's ZP4 address correction and certification software, you can correct and certify addresses (according to the requirements of the United States Postal Service) as you enter them into your database. If you are not already using ZP4, you can order it direct from Semaphore Corporation at http://www.semaphorecorp.com/cgi/order.html. A new CD must be purchased every two months in order to keep all address data up-to-date. Since ZP4 can be shared over a network, it is not necessary to purchase a CD for every workstation that accesses QuickFill.
Note: sharing ZP4 over a network
If you plan to share ZP4 over a network, we recommend that you select the "customize" option in ZP4's install program and install the entire address database on the hard disk of the computer on which you are installing it. Doing so will provide better performance and allow you to run ZP4 without having the ZP4 CD in your CD-drive.
If you use a software package other than ZP4 for address correction and certification, you can correct and certify addresses outside of QuickFill and then use the 'Customer data import' to import updated customer records back into your database.
As mentioned above, QuickFill provides the ability to use ZP4 to correct and certify customers' addresses as you enter them into your database. In addition, using ZP4 with QuickFill saves you keystrokes. For example, if you omit the city name and state from a customer's address, ZP4 will determine them from the street address and zip code. Or, if you omit the state and zip code, ZP4 will try to determine them from the address and city.
After installing ZP4, simply follow the steps below to begin reaping the benefits of address correction and certification software.
In a single user system where QuickFill is running on the computer where ZP4 is installed, all you need to do is run the ZP4 program before you start QuickFill. QuickFill will connect to ZP4 using DDE (Dynamic Data Exchange). For maximum convenience we suggest copying and pasting the ZP4 icon into your startup folder. If you accepted the default installation for ZP4 you will find it in the C:\ZP4 folder.
In
a multiuser system, or where QuickFill and ZP4 are on different computers,
you should not run the ZP4 program. Instead, you should run ZP4Share—a
program provided with your QuickFill installation. ZP4Share makes the
ZP4 database available to QuickFill over a local area network. To do this,
go to the computer that ZP4 is installed on, open 'My Computer' and browse
to the "ZP4Share" folder of the QuickFill program folder on
your server. Now double click "ZP4ShareInstall." To start ZP4Share
after running the setup program, click on the Start button, select Programs,
Startup and then "ZP4Share."
When using ZP4Share you also need to enter the name of the computer
on which ZP4 is installed in the 'ZP4
address correction server' field on the 'General' tab of the "Preferences"
definition screen. This should be done for each database since the setting
is stored in the database. After making the appropriate entry in the 'ZP4
address correction server' field, you must close the database and then
re-open it in order for the change to take effect.
When QuickFill opens a database it attempts to establish a connection to the ZP4 software. A "Connecting to ZP4 server" message briefly appears. If the connection is successful, a "ZP4" indicator appears on the bottom right of the screen. It also enables an "Address Lookup" button on the customer data entry screen. After entering an address you can click on the button and it will attempt to validate the address and determine the correct Zip+4+2 codes and the carrier route. Since the "Address Lookup" process is performed on the computer that contains the ZP4 Software (instead of across your network), you'll find that most addresses are certified in just a couple of seconds. If the address is successfully validated the changes are displayed and you can choose to accept them or undo the changes. If you accept the changes the address is assigned a certification date. As mentioned above, you can also omit parts of the address and ZP4 will try to fill them in for you.
If the original data that makes up a customer's address is in uppercase letters, the data returned to QuickFill from ZP4 will also be in uppercase letters. The case of the original data is determined by examining the contents of QuickFill's company, street1, street2, city, state, and zip code fields.