Attachment_(11)_Mail_Scanning_Procedures.pdf

MAIL SCANNING:

The purpose of mail scanning is to convert case related documents into digital image files in the Portable Document File (PDF) format that then may be accessed by attorneys, their Legal Staff Assistants (ESA's) and other designated recipients via hyperlinks to the designated DOJ network drive, or within the Hummingbird Document Management (DM) electronic files management system.

1. Mail Scanning Principal Steps:

a. Receiving the Post Office mail that has been sorted by the mail clerks for the ENRD sections we scan mail for. These are currently: Environmental Enforcement Section (EES), Natural Resources Section (NRS), Environmental Defense Section (EDS), Land Acquisition Section (LAS), and Indian Resources Section (IRS), Law and Policy Section (LPS).

b. Determine what mail is (or may be) case related.

c. Researching this mail in the Case Management System (CMS) to determine which case each piece of mail pertains to, and who should receive it.

d. Scan the mail and fill in the necessary data entry fields.

e. QC the scanned image and the information entered in the data fields, make any necessary corrections.

f. Generate emails, with the hyperlinks to the documents.

g. Send the emails.

h. Send the documents to the respective file room or other designated recipient.

Note that each Section has its own specific instructions and requirements.

Note: All DOJ sections have a distribution list (attoFneys and ESA). The list is updated by DOJ periodically, and provided to the Mail Room Supervisor. In order to do mail scanning, you will need all of the updated distribution lists. See you supervisor for these lists.

2. General Instructions for all sections:

a. Sort The Mail.

• The mail clerks will sort all incoming U.S. Post Office Mail that is not obviously non-case related (magazines, advertising mail, newspapers, etc), or that is marked "Confidential," is opened. This includes Certified, Express, and regular mail. For EES, personal mail is opened. For all other sections it is not. When a high volume of mail is received, the mail scan staff should take a few pieces to begin researching immediately. Be sure to inform the mail clerks, the amount of mail taken and for which section.

• Mail coming through special services, including FedEx, UPS, DHL, and courier services is not opened.

• Mail coming from the same address should be grouped together. These may be duplicate, or multiple, mailings of the same document, or there may be related to the same case. Open each piece of mail (unless it is marked "Confidential" or something similar), place the contents on top of each envelope, clip it or otherwise affix it together.

• Mail that has a clear recipient name, case name, DJ number or court number should be grouped together and processed first (i.e. process the easiest mail first).

• Mail that is generically addressed (for example to the Attorney General or to a Section Chief , or that has no clear case identification number, or which is bulky, with tabs, or otherwise likely to be time consuming should be processed last.

• The first page of each piece of mail is then date/time stamped, unless it is an original signature document, or when it is a professional certificate or other document that would obviously be damaged by stamping it. Personal, non case-related, mail is then placed in the box for its section for the mail clerks to deliver.

h. Research The Mail.

• The case related mail is then researched, in the CMS, to identify which DJ number each piece pertains to, who the lead attorney (plus any co-counsel) is. The general strategy is as follows:

~ Open the CMS, go to the "Quick list screen" If there is a court number (also known as a civil action, or ca number), enter that, placing an asterisk before and after it, then click on the ✓symbol or hit enter. If one or more cases come up, check other details, such as case title, court, litigating section, history, party data, and nature of case to verify that you have the right case.

~ If you do not find the case in this way, other fields that can be used include party name, site name, ENRD government rep., nickname, appellate court number.

~ Information may also be entered under "query by example" entering part of the case name (between asterisks) and the litigating section, then hit enter.

~ It is often necessary to examine various parts of a document, and to read parts of it, to get clues about the identity of the case. The date of the case and its stage also may clue you in on which case it is.

~ The key is to enter the minimum necessary information to find the case. If you enter too much information, the search results will be not successful.

Also, the case information may not be listed in CMS exactly as it reads on the document. If you enter too little, you may get too many cases. You have to search for certain key words.

~ Ability to identify cases is mainly a matter of practice, and learning the primary identifying characteristics of each Section, and the overall nuances of the way they have been entered into CMS.

An earnest effort should be made to research all case-related mail. However, mail sometimes does not contain enough information to identify the case, it may have confusing or conflicting information, or it maybe difficult to distinguish between two or more cases containing the same information. In these cases, it will be necessary to check with the ENRD Section Case Managers to make a determination. Examples: (Is this a new case?),'(Is DJno. correct?), (Not found in CMS under this site name. ), (Not found with this court number. j Try to be specific.

When using the Mailroom Matrix program, all research is entered into DM electronically.