Nebraska's mail scanning change (effective Nov 12, 2024): what families must know

Starting November 12, 2024, NDCS requires all incoming personal correspondence to go through a contracted vendor for scanning. Your letters, photos, and greeting cards no longer arrive as original paper items. Instead, they're scanned and delivered digitally.

Everything you include in a single piece of personal correspondence gets scanned into one PDF. That PDF is what gets delivered through the tablet system. So your letter and any photos you tuck in are treated as one combined packet.

NDCS expressly prohibits nude or partially nude photos or drawings in personal correspondence. This applies to everyone, including infants and newborns. Drawings or cartoons showing nudity count too. If you're sending family photos, look carefully at what's in the frame and skip anything that could be interpreted as nude or partially nude.

Watch out with pictures pulled from social media. NDCS lists "images from social media" among the types of content that can be prohibited in personal correspondence. Screenshots or downloaded images from social platforms can get your entire mail rejected.

Don't put money in with personal correspondence. If the vendor receives funds along with your mail, NDCS policy says the funds will be returned to the sender.

Here's the tricky part: what happens to the letter and photos that were mailed alongside the funds? NDCS policy says the personal correspondence itself may or may not be returned to the sender. There's no guarantee you'll get it back.

Personal correspondence is just one category of mail. NDCS handles funds, publications, and packages differently. Those items must be sent directly to the facility (not the scanning vendor) and addressed using the incarcerated individual's committed name (or legally changed name) and institutional number.

• ✓ Incarcerated individual’s committed name (or legally changed name) and institutional number
• ✓ Facility name (the facility where the person is assigned)
• ✓ Facility post box number
• ✓ Facility city, state, and ZIP code

Practical Checklist

• ✓ Keep personal correspondence “clean”: no nude or partially nude photos or drawings, including infants/newborns.
• ✓ Avoid sending images that originate from social media (screenshots, downloaded profile pictures, reposted images), since these can be prohibited.
• ✓ Do not include any funds with personal correspondence. If money is found, it is returned to you.
• ✓ Send funds, publications, and packages to the facility (not the scanning vendor).
• ✓ Address funds, publications, and packages with the incarcerated person’s committed or legally changed name and institutional number.
• ✓ Include the full facility addressing details (facility name, facility post box number, and facility city/state/ZIP) when sending funds, publications, or packages.
• ✓ Remember the single-PDF rule: if any part violates NDCS or vendor policy, the entire PDF is rejected.

Since NDCS policy says correspondence may or may not be returned if funds are included, protect yourself upfront. Use a clear, accurate return address. And keep a copy of anything you'd be upset to lose: photos, long letters, or one-of-a-kind cards.

Your loved one receives the scanned version, not the original paper. NDCS scans all contents of personal correspondence into a single PDF for delivery through the tablet system. Letters, greeting cards, and photos all arrive together in that one file.

If your mail gets rejected, the single-PDF rule is usually why it feels "all or nothing." Any part that violates NDCS policy or the vendor's policy causes the entire PDF to be rejected. Nothing goes through. On top of that, if you included funds with personal correspondence, NDCS policy says the money will be returned to you, but the correspondence itself may or may not come back. That's one more reason to never send money in the same envelope as a letter or photos.