December 2025 | Issue 21

USPS Changes

We plan to release a new version of BillMax before the end of this year that supports the new USPS API. If you are using our current USPS integration for address verification, it will no longer work after January 25, 2026 because USPS is retiring its legacy Web Tools address-verification API.

Impacts and Recommendations

Impact on Your BillMax System

• If you do nothing, address verification will fail after January 25, 2026.
• Disabling the current address-verification setting will prevent errors but will also mean addresses will not be automatically validated or standardized until you upgrade.

What You Need to Do

1. On or before January 25, 2026:

• If you are not ready to upgrade, temporarily disable address verification in System Administration → Global Options by removing "usps" in the Address Verification Function field.

2. When the new BillMax Debian release is available (planned before year-end):

• Upgrade BillMax to the new version that supports the USPS API.

• Create a new USPS API account at https://developers.usps.com/getting-started

• Retrieve your new Client ID and Client Secret and update the BillMax list 'USPS'.

3. After completing the steps above:

• Re-enable address verification to restore full functionality by updating the Address Verification Function field.

Context

As announced by United States Postal Service (USPS), the legacy “Web Tools” address-validation API platform will be permanently retired on January 25, 2026. That means the existing BillMax integration, which relies on the Web Tools API to verify addresses against the USPS database in real time, will completely stop functioning after that date. There is no fallback support for the legacy API, so without an upgrade, address verification will no longer occur and any attempted lookups will fail. The retirement is part of USPS’s migration to a modern API platform (the “USPS APIs”) - a change designed to provide a more secure, reliable, and up-to-date system for address standardization, validation, and other postal services.

Our Response

We plan to release a new version of BillMax before the end of this year that supports the new USPS API. The coding is complete and it is being run through our testing protocol. Watch for the release announcement.