Traditionally, regular shipping customers of UPS Inc. receive a daily visit from one of the company's drivers even if the customer has no packages to be picked up that day. Now, for small to mid-sized businesses, the delivery game has changed.

Unveiled last week in New York, a new service called UPS Smart Pickup ensures that a UPS driver will stop at a location for a pickup only when there is a shipment to be picked up. The Atlanta-based giant said the service, which is now in effect, is ideal for customers who want the convenience of a scheduled pickup but who may not need to ship a package every day.

The move, which is part of the company's Decision Green environmental program, is designed to help the carrier reduce the amount of fuel it burns. Company executives said the new initiative will eliminate 8 million miles from the total driven by UPS each year in the United States. UPS said it will save 793,000 gallons of fuel and cut 7,800 metric tons of CO**subscript{2} emissions as a result.

"Before UPS Smart Pickup, UPS would often arrive at a customer's location only to discover that the customer had no packages for pickup that day," said David Barnes, UPS's chief information officer, in a statement. "For the first time, a UPS service integrates the company's operational and customer-facing technology to eliminate unnecessary stops."

Barnes said a customer using existing UPS shipping technology will be able to process a package for shipment each day prior to a predetermined cutoff time. The shipping system then automatically communicates with the carrier's internal operations systems to notify drivers via their handheld computers that a pickup is required, without the need for the customer to make a phone call or schedule a shipment online. The result is that a pickup is only scheduled when a customer processes a package in a UPS shipping system, Barnes said.

Barnes said the service is a good choice for customers "interested in cost-effective ways to make environmentally responsible choices, while at the same time helping UPS reduce miles and lessen our carbon footprint." UPS will charge a weekly flat fee of $10 for the service.