Patent ID: 8005260

Claim:
A method for sorting mail comprising: performing an automatic address recognition process on a digitized image of a mail piece; generating a plurality of conditional address recognition results and a plurality of confirmation values each associated with one of the plurality of conditional address recognition results; sending the digitized image, the plurality of conditional address recognition results and the plurality of confirmation values to a video coding system; performing a first video coding operation to obtain a first video coding result; detecting a possible error in the first video coding result in real time as the first video coding result is being formed in the video coding system by a video coding operator, the possible error detected using error correction information including information from the automatic address recognition process; indicating the possible error in real time to the video coding operator in the video coding system; performing a video coding operation to obtain a second video coding result; and arbitrating the first video coding result, the second video coding result and an automatic recognition result to determine: a) whether to select one of the first video coding result, the second video coding result and the automatic recognition result as an output, and b) whether to perform an additional video coding operation or automatic address recognition operation on the image.