Delivery Point Validation (DPV)

For example, a company wants to send out marketing material, such as a paper catalog, to its customers. They need to use DPV lookup; otherwise, they risk losing resources. Let’s say that the company has customer data showing that Sarah Johnson lives at 145 Oak Street. They mail her the catalog, but Sarah’s real address is 154 Oak Street. The mail never reaches her, wasting both time and money. 

By looking up and verifying address information using Delivery Point Validation, companies can validate the address info against official delivery records and ensure that details like the street number are correct. If the address doesn’t exist or is undeliverable, the system will flag it.

E-commerce companies, banks, insurance providers, logistics firms, real estate platforms, and similar entities, which typically need to comply with stricter KYC/AML regulations, commonly use DPV. For example, an online store can use it to ensure customers enter a real, deliverable address at checkout. Financial institutions often combine DPV with identity verification measures, like those provided by iDenfy, to ensure both the person and the address are authentic.

Lost shipments, higher shipping costs, and even fraud are all dangers that companies might face when not verifying addresses. Ultimately, undeliverable addresses lead to frustrated customers waiting on delayed deliveries, wasted postage and processing time, the extra work of manually fixing addresses, and inaccurate data that disrupts business operations and harms the company in general, especially when it comes to scaling and ensuring customer trust. DPV helps avoid these risks and ensures that addresses are legitimate. 

Yes. Fraudsters often use fake or incomplete addresses to avoid detection. DPV and other proof of address (PoA) processes help detect these cases early by verifying the legitimacy of delivery points. Combined with identity verification solutions from companies like iDenfy, DPV makes it harder for bad actors to misuse false information. DPV and database verification are often used in high-risk scenarios, for example, before a large transaction, to confirm that the payment is authorized, there aren’t any red flags, and that the person is using a legitimate address and other personal details (which aren’t forged or stolen). 

Not exactly. Address validation confirms that a street, city, and ZIP code are real. DPV goes deeper by checking if the exact delivery point, or the full address, exists. For example, it won’t just confirm “123 Main Street” is valid, but also whether “Apartment 5B” is recognized as legitimate and deliverable.

Using a Delivery Point Validation solution helps ensure the mail reaches the right recipient and doesn’t go to waste to a non-existent address. It helps avoid errors and typos. For example, without a DPV solution or looking up an address in a database, mail meant for “75 River Road, Suite 210” might be sent to “75 River Road” without the suite number, causing it to end up undelivered or returned. This helps minimize wasted postage and printing costs, as well as the frustration linked to lost or returned mail.