5 Common Mistakes Families Make When Mailing Letters to Upshur County Jail

Want your letter delayed or returned? Leave off the SO number. For mail going through the NCIC processing address, format your envelope like this: Inmate Name, SO# (booking number), Facility Name, P.O. Box 591, Longview, TX 75606. The SO number routes your mail to the right person - double-check it before sealing the envelope.

Close to the limit? Count pages the way the scanner does: every sheet in the envelope adds to your total. If you have a longer update, split it into two separate letters - five pages or fewer each. Go over, and the whole thing may not get scanned or delivered.

NCIC scans mail front-side only. Anything on the back of a page won't make it through - it's flagged as a problem, not read as a bonus message. Keep everything single-sided.

Slipping in a few extra photos "just this once" is another common mistake. Upshur County Jail's NCIC mail rules allow one photo per mailing - max. Send more than one, and the entire letter gets returned. Nothing gets scanned or delivered.

Mail also gets lost when families send the wrong items to the NCIC P.O. Box. Regular inmate mail goes through NCIC, but books, magazines, newspapers, legal mail, and medical mail do not. Those need to go directly to the facility following their mail rules - not to the P.O. Box.

• ✓ Letters and other regular inmate mail (not books/magazines/newspapers/legal/medical) - mail to the NCIC processing address (P.O. Box 591, Longview, TX 75606)
• ✓ Books - do not send to the NCIC P.O. Box; mail to the facility instead
• ✓ Magazines - do not send to the NCIC P.O. Box; mail to the facility instead
• ✓ Newspapers - do not send to the NCIC P.O. Box; mail to the facility instead
• ✓ Legal mail - do not send to the NCIC P.O. Box; mail to the facility instead
• ✓ Medical mail - do not send to the NCIC P.O. Box; mail to the facility instead