Patent ID: 7394914

Claim:
A method of automatically sorting mail, which has to be forwarded, by means of a sorting machine that processes the mail in a continuous main stream and where the sorting machine comprises a feeder via which a variety of unsorted addressed mail is fed, the method comprising: marking singled mail with an individualizing identifier by an ante positioned marking device; assigning each identifier to a data set in a file; detecting addresses on pieces of the mail by an ante positioned reading device; deciphering each detected address by a recognition module; writing each detected address in the corresponding data set; assigning a corresponding error information to a mail piece when the address on that mail piece cannot be deciphered, wherein the error information is coded in the data set, and the coding lies in the explicit writing of the data set or in not filling necessary fields; sorting the mail with assigned error information out of the main stream as scrap mail, wherein the scrap mail tagged with an error information is recognized by the assigned tag and the data set assigned to the tag; and the scrap mail is sorted out of the main stream by means of a switch controlled by the detector; and feeding the scrap mail again into the feeder together with additional unsorted mail after the address of the scrap mail has been verified and has been written in a corresponding data set, wherein the fed again scrap mail is automatically recognized as such.