Barnet Council in KAS Compact inserter upgrade
Print Solutions Finishing Solutions
The London Borough of Barnet’s (LBB) Document Centre and Mailroom has upgraded its KAS Mailmaster 565 envelope inserter with a DL-C4 Mailmaster Compact, again from KAS Paper Systems.
LBB’s Document Centre and Mailroom employs 14 full time staff, running two Ricoh colour printers, several Kyocera MFDs, an HP large format plotter, a Polar guillotine, a Stahl folder, a Citoborma drill and an FSN numbering machine.
‘The department has only ever run KAS inserters, the first two being purchased when the Community Charge or Poll Tax was introduced in 1990,’ explained Simon Hime, manager of the Document Centre and Mailroom.
He goes on to say that ‘with the outsourcing of what later became the Council Tax mailing by Capita, which was by now running the department, only one inserter was required, so we replaced the two KAS inserters with the DL to C5 Mailmaster 565 in 2001.’
‘Although the Mailmaster 565 was still running well after more than 20 years, it was starting to show its age at times, and it couldn’t insert into C4 envelopes,’ continued Simon. ‘So, when KAS offered a showroom demonstration of its Mailmaster Compact, which can do C4 as well as C5 and DL, we jumped at the opportunity, bringing our own letters and envelopes to test on the machine. Following a successful demonstration, the machine was ordered and delivered in late summer this year.’
Asked about the installation and training, he responded: ‘Even though there are similarities with the 565, we were impressed at how seamless and quick it all was, only taking a couple of hours. The KAS engineer also returned after a few weeks, to check how we were getting on, as well as train up some additional machine operators,’
As to the Compact’s performance since installation, Simon added: ‘It has been absolutely fine. As well as now being able to insert C4 envelopes, the Compact eats up, with changeovers in minutes, our multiple, short run jobs, including pre-folded A1 size planning applications, stapled sets and thicker books up to 7 mm, often at up to the maximum speed of 6000 envelopes per hour.’
He continued, ‘We may look at retrofitting a KAS letter feeder with code reading, if we do more elections work such as the ITR (Invitation to Register) or if we start hybrid mailings.’
The Mailmaster encloses up to 6000 envelopes per hour. As well as the letter, which can be folded in line once or twice for inserting into C5 or DL, or fed flat for inserting into C4, the Compact can feed two other separate documents, such as single page flat or pre-folded flyers, reply envelopes and stitched booklets up to 7 mm thick.
