Personator Consumer:FAQ

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Service Speed

What kinds of speeds/throughput can the Personator Consumer Web Service do?

The following are the average speeds for 1 Thread vs 10 Threads, for different combinations of Actions selected:

Action	Throughput (rec / hour) Average 1 Thread	Throughput (rec / hour) Average 10 Threads
Check Only	150K	600K-750K
Check + Verify	80K	300K-400K
Check + Append	80K	300K-400K
Address + Geo	50K	160K-260K
Check + Move	30K	150K-250K
All Actions	30K	150K-250K

Batch Processing

What are some best practices for requesting large amounts of data?

It is recommended that when processing large amounts of records that it be submitted in batches of 100 records per request. Personator has the ability to accept multiple records for each request using either the XML or JSON protocols. An example of the Request Structure for multiple records can be found here: Personator Consumer:Batch JSON

Multi-threading is also standard practice in order to get higher throughputs.

Are there server-side limitations on threading?

The server currently does not have a limit the amount of threads that you submit to it. However, for batch processing records (having 100 records per request), it is recommended that no more than 10 simultaneous threads are running. Please advise your CSR if more threads are required so that proper accommodations can be set in place.

Minimum Input Requirements

What are the minimum input requirements for each Action?

Check

Must satisfy any one of these combinations:

1. (Address and Zip)
2. (Address, City and State)
3. Phone Number
4. Email
5. Full Name

If combinations of fields are selected, make sure that the minimum requirements are always met for those that have 2 or more fields required.

So for example, if a user selects a Phone Number and Address, it should not pass unless they also input either a Zip or the City & State

Verify

User must satisfy 2 or more of the following conditions:

1. (Address, City and State) OR (Address and Zip) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for an address is met
2. Phone
3. Email
4. (Full Name) OR (Last Name Only) OR (First and Last Name) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for a Name is met
5. Company

So for example, satisfying condition 1 and 5 will meet the Minimum Input Requirements for Verify.

All combinations of 2 or more will satisfy the minimum input requirements for Verify with the exception of combination 4 and 5. Therefore, selecting Full Name and Company does not satisfy the minimum input requirements for Verify.

Move Update

User must satisfy at least one of the following combinations:

1. Address and Full Name
2. Address, First and Last Name

Append

The Minimum Input requirements for Append will be dependent on which field you are trying to append information for. For example, appending missing names will have a different minimum input, as opposed to appending addresses. The following are the list elements that can be appended and the minimum requirements for each:

Append Names/Company

Must have at least one of these:

1. (Address, City and State) OR (Address and Zip) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for an address is met
2. Phone
3. Email

Append Addresses

Must have at least one of these:

1. Phone
2. Email
3. Full Name + Date of Birth
4. Full Name + Year of Birth
5. Full Name + Full SSN
6. Full Name + Last 4 SSN
7. Last Name + Full SSN

Append GeoCoding

This one is going to be a little different. The minimum input requirements will depend on other Options you currently have selected.

If Only the check action is enabled, and GeoCoding is Selected, the user must satisfy at least 1 of the following minimum input requirements:

1. (Address, City and State) OR (Address and Zip) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for address are first met
2. Phone Number – Personator Consumer can give you Phone Lat Long.

If GeoCoding is selected and the Append Action is also enabled, the user can satisfy any 1 of the following minimum input requirements:

1. (Address, City and State) OR (Address and Zip) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for address are first met
2. Phone Number
3. Email Address – You can append addresses or phone numbers using just emails, which will then give you the Appended Address’ or Phone Numbers’ Lat/Long
4. Full Name + Date of Birth
5. Full Name + Year of Birth
6. Full Name + Full SSN
7. Full Name + Last 4 SSN
8. Last Name + Full SSN

Append Phones

Must have at least one of these:

1. (Address, City and State) OR (Address and Zip) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for an address is met
2. Email
3. Full Name + Date of Birth
4. Full Name + Year of Birth
5. Full Name + Full SSN
6. Full Name + Last 4 SSN
7. Last Name + Full SSN

Append Emails

Must have at least one of these:

1. (Address, City and State) OR (Address and Zip) – must first make sure that the minimum requirements for an address is met
2. Phone
3. Full Name + Date of Birth
4. Full Name + Year of Birth
5. Full Name + Full SSN
6. Full Name + Last 4 SSN
7. Last Name + Full SSN

Data Sources

Where does the Data from the Personator Consumer Web Service Come from?

The Personator Consumer Database is compiled from several sources and industries such as Property Information Data, Loan Data, Credit Data, Telephone Data and several other private sources. The final combined database merges all contact records including Addresses, Phone Numbers, Emails and Names amounting to over a billion records of historical and current information. This data is then exposed through the Personator Consumer Web Service which allows for checking, verifying, appending and updating contact records. Since the service revolves heavily around the contents of the data, the exact provider for the sources is not something we can disclose at the moment as we prefer to keep this information private in order to maintain the product’s uniqueness and value in the industry.

NCOA and Personator Consumer Move Differences

What is the difference between Smart Mover NCOA and Personator Moves?

The primary difference between NCOA and Personator Moves is that Smart Mover NCOA processing requires that records be processed as a batch and should only be used for mailing purposes. Personator moves on the other hand allows for real-time single record processing of moves and does not require you to do mailing. This limitation on NCOA Data is set by the USPS in accordance to their license agreement of using the NCOA Database.

Here are other differences between Smart Mover NCOA and Personator Moves:

	Smart Mover NCOA	Personator Move
Minimum Input Requirements	Full Name and Address OR Last Name and Address	Full Name and Address OR Last Name and Address
Data Source	USPS National Change of Address Database only.	Proprietary compilation of multiple data providers including: Social Security Data, Property Data, Telco Data and other Consumer Data Sources. Personator also uses a set of proprietary algorithms in order to infer move information.
Coverage of Move Data	Detect Moves for up to 4 years back.	Detect Moves all the way from 2007.
Move Dates	Yes	Yes
Append Demographic Information	No	Yes
Batch Processing	Yes	Yes
USPS PAF Form	Required	Not Required
NCOA Report	Yes	No
CASS Report	Yes	No

Maximum Length Response

What is the Maximum Length Response that we can Expect to Receive for Each Field in Personator Consumer?

The Web Service Response, in general, does not have a maximum length for each Response Field. This is to avoid any form of truncation when returning information from our data. We do however have recommended values which you can set for defining field lengths in your table.

Response Field	Length
MD_NameFull	256
MD_CompanyName	128
MD_Results	100
MD_EmailAddress	75
MD_PlaceName	60
MD_CBSATitle	55
MD_CBSADivisionTitle	55
MD_AddressExtras	50
MD_AddressLine2	50
MD_AddressLine1	50
MD_DomainName	50
MD_AddressStreetName	40
MD_NameLast2	35
MD_NameFirst2	35
MD_NameFirst	35
MD_City	35
MD_CBSALevel	35
MD_NameLast	35
MD_CBSADivisionLevel	35
MD_AddressTypeCode	31
MD_PhoneNumber	30
MD_StateName	25
MD_CountyName	25
MD_CountryName	25
MD_MailboxName	25
MD_NamePrefix	20
MD_NameSuffix	20
MD_NamePrefix2	20
MD_AddressRouteService	20
MD_Suite	20
MD_Salutation	20
MD_NameMiddle2	20
MD_NameMiddle	20
MD_AddressLockBox	20
MD_NameSuffix2	20
MD_AddressDeliveryInstallation	20
MD_State	15
MD_PrivateMailBox	15
MD_UrbanizationName	15
MD_PhoneExtension	14
MD_CityAbbreviation	13
MD_Latitude	12
MD_Longitude	12
MD_DeliveryPointCheckDigit	11
MD_AddressKey	11
MD_CountryCode	10
MD_AddressPrivateMailboxName	10
MD_AddressPrivateMailboxRange	10
MD_AddressSuiteName	10
MD_TopLevelDomain	10
MD_PostalCode	10
MD_AddressStreetSuffix	10
MD_AddressSuiteNumber	10
MD_PlaceCode	7
MD_UTC	6
MD_CensusTract	6
MD_AddressPreDirection	5
MD_CBSADivisionCode	5
MD_CBSACode	5
MD_AddressPostDirection	5
MD_CountyFIPS	5
MD_PhoneSuffix	4
MD_AddressHouseNumber	4
MD_CensusBlock	4
MD_CarrierRoute	4
MD_Plus4	4
MD_PhonePrefix	3
MD_AreaCode	3
MD_NewAreaCode	3
MD_DeliveryPointCode	2
MD_CongressionalDistrict	2
MD_Gender	1
MD_DeliveryIndicator	1
MD_Gender2	1

Demographics

What are the types of demographics that Personator Consumer can return?

Personator Consumer can return the following demographics:

Date of Birth

This will be in the format YYYYMM. So the accuracy will only be to the Month.

Date of Death

We will be returning the full date of death in the format YYYYMMDD

Presence of Children

Indicates the presence of children in the household

Value
Unknown
No Children Present
Children Present

Marital Status

Indicates whether the Individual is married or not

Value
Unknown
Definitely Single
Inferred Single
Inferred Married
Definitely Married

Rent/Own

Indicates whether the Individual is either a renter or an owner or property

Value
Unknown
Definite Renter
Inferred Renter
Inferred Owner
Definite Owner

Demographic Gender

Indicates Gender based on Demographics Data

Value
Unknown
Male
Female
Neutral

Household Income

Indicates the range of the Household’s Income

Value
Unknown
$0-$15,000
$15,001-$20,000
$20,001-$30,000
$30,001-$40,000
$40,001-$50,000
$50,001-$60,000
$60,001-$70,000
$70,001-$80,000
$80,001-$90,000
$90,001-$100,000
$100,001-$125,000
$125,001-$150,000
$150,001+

Length of Residence

Indicates the range of the Individual’s length of residency in his current address

Value
Less than 1 year
1-2 years
2-3 years
3-4 years
4-5 years
5-6 years
6-7 years
7-8 years
8-9 years
9-10 years
10-11 years
11-12 years
12-13 years
13-14 years
14-15 years
15+ years
Unknown

Occupation

Indicates the category for the Individual’s Occupation

Value
Physician/Dentist
Healthcare
Lawyer/Judge
Professional/Technical
Management
Teacher/Educator
Sales/Marketing
Clerical/Service Worker
Tradesmen/Laborer
Farmer
Student
Homemaker
Retired
Federal Employee
Unknown
Military
Military Retired
Other
Business Owner
Religious
Self Employed
Financial

Result Code Differences

Personator Consumer has the ability to return codes within the AS, AC, AE, VR, VS, and DA groupings (not counting the Demographic Result codes). At a high level, these groupings correlate to the following:

AS – Address Status

If we were able to validate the address to some level, we will return an AS result code, the most common being AS01 if the address is fully verified. However, we can return other AS codes to mean things such as street only match (AS02 – perhaps there is a missing apartment), non USPS match (AS03 – the address cannot receive mail from USPS but can possibly receive mail from other carriers), foreign address (AS09 – we identified this as an address from a different country), and more.

• AS - Address Status

AC – Address Change

If for whatever reason the input address isn’t able to be verified outright, but there may be a misspelling, incorrect street name or number, the city has an alias, and things of that nature, we will change it to the USPS certified address and return an AC code determining what we changed. For example, if there is no input postal code, or it is incorrect compared to the city and state that is inputted, then we will correct the postal code and return AC01. If there is a misspelling in the street name that we can correct and then verify the address with, then we will correct that street name and return AC10. If for whatever reason you input a second address line into AddressLine1 and a first address line into AddressLine2 and we were able to identify the correct address, then we will swap the two lines and return AC06.

• AC - Address Change

AE – Address Error

If we are not able to validate or correct any part of the input address, then we will return the input address untouched, and return an AE code determining why we couldn’t validate the address. If there is an error with the postal code, then we will return AE01, if the address is non-deliverable, we will return AE04, if you are missing the minimum pieces to validate an address (first addressline and either city/state or postal code), then we will return an AE07.

• AE - Address Error

VR – Verify Results

VR codes will only return if the “Verify” action is enabled within Personator Consumer. What essentially happens with the verify action is that the input data will be compared against Personator Consumer’s proprietary database behind the scenes, and a matching record will try to be found. If the matching record is found, then we will return VR codes stating what pieces of information matched. As an example, let’s say you input:

• Tom Smith - 123 Main Street, CA 90210 – Phone: 555 555 1234
• And we found a record in the Personator Consumer data with: Tom Smith – 123 Main Street, CA 90210 – Phone: 555 555 5678, then we will return VR01, stating that the individual name and individual address matched what we have in Personator Consumer.
• If we found a record in the Personator Consumer data with: Tom Smith – 123 Main Street, CA 90210 – Phone: 555 555 1234, then we will return VR01, VR04. Meaning we matched the individual name and address (VR01), and also matched the individual address and phone (VR04).
• Note that the priority in the codes that return are in the following order: address, phone, email, name.
• VR - Verify Results

VS – Verify Status

These codes also only return if the “Verify” action is enabled, and essentially tells the user if we couldn’t find a certain piece of information in our reference data or there was a partial match. Let’s take the same example as above:

• Tom Smith - 123 Main Street, CA 90210 – Phone: 555 555 1234
• We found a record in the Personator Consumer data with: Tammy Smith – 123 Main Street, CA 90210 – Phone: 555 555 5678, then we will return VR01, but also return a VS12, which is a last name match. This is because we found a matching record but only had a partial name match.
• Let’s say for that same example, we do not have the input phone number in our data at all, then we will return a VS30, stating that the phone is not found in our reference data.
• VS - Verify Status

DA – Append

These codes only return if the “Append” action is enabled, and tells you what piece of information we appended from our reference data to the service output. Let’s say you input the following information:

• Tom Smith - 123 Main Street, CA 90210
• And we found the following record in Personator Consumer: Tom Smith - 123 Main Street, CA 90210 – Phone: 555 555 1234 – Email: tomsmith@gmail.com
• We will then return the phone number and email, with the DA30 (phone appended) and DA40 (email appended) codes.
• Note that all of the domains covered in Personator Consumer (name, address, phone, email) are able to be appended and centricities and append conditions can be manipulated with the “CentricHint” and “Append” options (Personator Consumer Request - Centric Hint and Personator Consumer Request - Append 2)
• DA - Append Results

Email Validity Degree

If Personator returns ES01 / ES02 / ES03 this means that Personator did not find the email in our database; meaning that the email was validated at a domain level.

If Personator returns ES01,ES21 / ES02,EE##/ES21 this means that Personator found the email address in our database.

It’s entirely possible that Personator may return ES01 initially, and an hour later return ES02,EE04,ES21.

Census 2010, 2020 Support

Does Personator support 2010 Census Information? How about the 2020 Census?

Personator has the ability to return the Decennial 2010 Census when requested for. This is the option for it: Personator Consumer Request - DecennialCensusKey

The REST request would look like so:

https://personator.melissadata.net/v3/WEB/ContactVerify/doContactVerify?&id=CUSTOMERID&act=Check&cols=GrpCensus,GrpCensus2&opt=DecennialCensusKey:2010&first=&last=&full=&a1=918%20W%20Bridgetowne%20Ct&a2=&city=Dunlap&state=IL&postal=&ctry=&lastline=&bday=&bmo=&byr=&ss=&phone=&email=&mak=8008006245&comp=&ip=&ff=&format=JSON

The future plan for Personator is to support the Decennial 2010 Census, Decennial 2020 Census, and the yearly Census Data from 2021, onwards.

Here are the timelines for release and what you get back depending on what is set for DecennialCensusKey Option:

Currently Released in Personator:

Option	Value	Result
DecennialCensusKey	2010	Returns the 2010 Census Data
DecennialCensusKey	off	(Default) Returns the 2019 Census Data

Next Update to Personator (Estimate: Nov 2021):

Option	Value	Result
DecennialCensusKey	2010	Returns the 2010 Census Data
DecennialCensusKey	2020	Returns the 2020 Census Data
DecennialCensusKey	off	(Default) Returns the 2020 Census Data

When 2021 Census Data is Available (Estimate: Q2 of 2022):

Option	Value	Result
DecennialCensusKey	2010	Returns the 2010 Census Data
DecennialCensusKey	2020	Returns the 2020 Census Data
DecennialCensusKey	off	(Default) Returns the 2021 Census Data

Append Rates

What are the append rates for the demographics?

The following are the append rates for demographics:

US Only Contact Data

Domain	Append Rate
Name	60-70%
Phone	30-50%
Email	10-30%
Address	60-70%

US Only Demographic Data

Demographic	Append Rate
Income	60-70%
Length of Residence	60-70%
Own/Rent	45-55%
Occupation	35-45%
Presence of Children	50-60%
Marital Status	55-65%
Date of Death	50-60%
Date of Birth	50-60%
Demographics Gender	85-95%
Credit Card Users	45-55%
Ethnic Code	35-45%
Ethnic Group	30-40%
Presence of Senior	20-30%
Children Age Range	10-20%
Political Party	25-35%
Household Size	65-75%
Education	30-40%
SSN	25-35%
Moves	70-80%
Move Date	80-90%

Canada Only Contact Data

Based on Total of Residential Addresses

Domain	Append Rate
Name	30-40%
Phone	< 10%
Email	< 10%
Address	30-40%

Canada Only Demographic Data

Based on Total of Residential Addresses

Demographic	Append Rate
Income	20-30%
Length of Residence
Own/Rent
Occupation
Presence of Children
Marital Status
Date of Death
Date of Birth	5-10%
Demographics Gender	10-20%
Education

Returned Mail Marked as Vacant

Why does some of my mail get returned and marked as Vacant?

Personator has a result code that specifically indicates that an address is vacant (AS16). Addresses marked with the AS16 result code should not be sent any mail at this time.

Please note that it takes time before new vacant address information makes it’s way to the service. When the USPS flags an address as vacant, that information will eventually make its way into the USPS Database, and get sent to us on a future update. So there is a gap between the time an address becomes vacant, to the time we get new monthly data from the USPS Data which has this new vacant flag and our services get updated with it.