Eircode - its implemetation (merged)

ukoda

gctest50 wrote: »

.

Is this what the ambulance service use?

xband

I work with plenty of small businesses and if you think an advert asking people to come visit your website and enter your eircode to see if we can serve you would work you're absolutely kidding yourself. About 2% of people would do that.

It might make sense for a cable company or some utility where you're already engaged with a sign up process and need to verify a specific address but, for a small business, you're just going to mention a list of areas and keep things simple.

Getting the general public to engage with you at all is difficult. Getting them to key codes into a website us even more difficult.

You guys are being extremely arrogantly, patronisingly dismissive of anyone who disagrees with you and it's making posting on this forum unpleasant.

I came on here to make a few points about eircode from my own perspective and I was accused of beings "one of those" or something by the poster below and generally given a really nasty reception.

ukoda wrote: »

Ah yes, now I definitely know which one you are

I honestly couldn't give a **** about eircode. It seems like a stupid system to me but I'm not allowed to express an opinion on here.

ukoda

xband wrote: »

I work with plenty of small businesses and if you think an advert asking people to come visit your website and enter your eircode to see if we can serve you would work you're absolutely kidding yourself. About 2% of people would do that.

It might make sense for a cable company or some utility where you're already engaged with a sign up process and need to verify a specific address but, for a small business, you're just going to mention a list of areas and keep things simple.

Getting the general public to engage with you at all is difficult. Getting them to key codes into a website us even more difficult.

You guys are being extremely arrogantly, patronisingly dismissive of anyone who disagrees with you and it's making posting on this forum unpleasant.

I came on here to make a few points about eircode from my own perspective and I was accused of beings "one of those" or something by the poster below and generally given a really nasty reception.



I honestly couldn't give a **** about eircode. It seems like a stupid system to me but I'm not allowed to express an opinion on here.

I didn't say to advertise specifically to drive people to look up their eircode on your website, but I believe there's merit in having such a service available on your website when there's ambiguity about the areas you cover or the boundaries of your service, if you disagree with that, then that's fine.

The winky face means it's in jest

TheChizler

There's an idea for a service one of the VARs could provide; a plugin for your website where the user puts in their Eircode and it says whether they're in a service area or not based on a map outline the business owner has drawn in the customer area of the VAR's website. The VAR could report back which small areas have the most requests. They could charge a few cent per lookup or a few Euro per month. The business isn't wasting time and money on phone bills responding to queries from the public and gets the benefit of market research thrown in.

plodder

marmurr1916 wrote: »

Small businesses have been doing this for decades.

Have you never seen ads in your local paper, heard them on your local radio station, seen them in your local Golden Pages etc?

"Murphy Painters & Decorators. Covering Tipperary Town, Cahir, Cashel, Bansha, Dundrum and all of south-west Co. Tipp. Free estimates, quality work guaranteed by time-served painters & decorators. Call now on 1800 555 555."

Sometimes I wonder if some of the posters here live in the real world.

Cheap shot. What I was asking was if any businesses are putting a box on their website to tell you what areas they cover, based on you entering your Eircode, since that's what we are discussing here, is it not? Why would any small business that doesn't already license Eircode do that considering it costs money and it's cheaper to list the codes they cover for free?

ukoda

plodder wrote: »

Cheap shot. What I was asking was if any businesses are putting a box on their website to tell you what areas they cover, based on you entering your Eircode, since that's what we are discussing here, is it not? Why would any small business that doesn't already license Eircode do that considering it costs money and it's cheaper to list the codes they cover for free?

Because of the reasons listed above I would have thought, it's easy for a customer, it could increase revenue, they could get market insight, it would be cheap if bought from a VAR, any reason they shouldn't or wouldn't do it? Besides it costs money? Because everything they do to increase business costs money.

But as said, it's not for every website, each would have to decide themselves if it's worth it. In some scenarios it would be far more effective to just list the areas they cover

plodder

ukoda wrote: »

Because of the reasons listed above I would have thought, it's easy for a customer, it could increase revenue, they could get market insight, it would be cheap if bought from a VAR, any reason they shouldn't or wouldn't do it? Besides it costs money? Because everything they do to increase business costs money.

Listing the postcode areas you cover doesn't cost money, which is presumably why that locksmith business did it.

But as said, it's not for every website, each would have to decide themselves if it's worth it. In some scenarios it would be far more effective to just list the areas they cover

Let's come back to this in a month or two and see how many small businesses that aren't using Eircode for some other purpose, have a query on their website that allows you to enter your eircode and the website tells you information about whether they provide service in that area or something similar.

ukoda

plodder wrote: »

Listing the postcode areas you cover doesn't cost money, which is presumably why that locksmith business did it.

Let's come back to this in a month or two and see how many small businesses that aren't using Eircode for some other purpose, have a query on their website that allows you to enter your eircode and the website tells you information about whether they provide service in that area or something similar.

I would say that if it was a ready made plugin they could just buy from a VAR (by-passing having to have their own licence fees etc and just a pay as you go model, few cent per look up) then it could be popular amongst some businesses. I would agree a business is unlikely to develop such a service themselves if not already a licence holder

plodder

So much opportunity for those who are willing to see it!

You're a man with vision and can spot an opportunity. Why don't you give it a go?

plodder

So much opportunity for those who are willing to see it!

You're a man with vision and can spot an opportunity clearly. Why don't you give it a go?

ukoda

plodder wrote: »

You're a man with vision and can spot an opportunity. Why don't you give it a go?

I'm happy in my current job, I'm not in the market for a new venture, but genuinely, I think there's an opportunity to build some very desirable services from eircode, and someone could make a great venture out of it. There's now over 20 pretty large companies who have signed up to be VAR's, they aren't doing that for the craic.

It's a bit like the guy who set up ballygowan bottled water, at the time, years and years ago, he was ridiculed for such a crazy idea "paying for water! Sur it's free from the tap! That'll never take off!"

marmurr1916

plodder wrote: »

Cheap shot. What I was asking was if any businesses are putting a box on their website to tell you what areas they cover, based on you entering your Eircode, since that's what we are discussing here, is it not? Why would any small business that doesn't already license Eircode do that considering it costs money and it's cheaper to list the codes they cover for free?

"Because of the reasons listed above I would have thought, it's easy for a customer, it could increase revenue, they could get market insight, it would be cheap if bought from a VAR, any reason they shouldn't or wouldn't do it? Besides it costs money? Because everything they do to increase business costs money.

But as said, it's not for every website, each would have to decide themselves if it's worth it. In some scenarios it would be far more effective to just list the areas they cover."

ukoda

marmurr1916 wrote: »

"Because of the reasons listed above I would have thought, it's easy for a customer, it could increase revenue, they could get market insight, it would be cheap if bought from a VAR, any reason they shouldn't or wouldn't do it? Besides it costs money? Because everything they do to increase business costs money.

But as said, it's not for every website, each would have to decide themselves if it's worth it. In some scenarios it would be far more effective to just list the areas they cover."

+1 I couldn't have put it better myself....

hans aus dtschl

I don't think that you can get potential customers to key in that sort of information, when you're at first-contact (trying to win the potential customers).
IMO this comes back to the same thing about the Eircode website requiring data entry from end-users and how that's a turn-off. Why should every interaction with Eircode have to be reciprocal? It's a service, not a product.
What they currently have implemented is good for some users, who do want to enter information. It's not as good for passive users who want the information "at-a-glance". Or who don't want to or cannot interact with an online database.

Like plenty of posters before me, I don't understand why this is such a red-line issue. We're not all "wrong" or "haters". It's a pretty simple observation IMO.

hans aus dtschl

I don't think that you can get potential customers to key in that sort of information, when you're at first-contact (trying to win the potential customers).
IMO this comes back to the same thing about the Eircode website requiring data entry from end-users and how that's a turn-off. Why should every interaction with Eircode have to be reciprocal? It's a service, not a product.
What they currently have implemented is good for some users, who do want to enter information. It's not as good for passive users who want the information "at-a-glance". Or who don't want to or cannot interact with an online database.

Like plenty of posters before me, I don't understand why this is such a red-line issue. We're not all "wrong" or "haters". It's a pretty simple observation IMO.

TheChizler

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

IMO this comes back to the same thing about the Eircode website requiring data entry from end-users and how that's a turn-off. Why should every interaction with Eircode have to be reciprocal? It's a service, not a product.

I may not be fully understanding you, but short of them providing you with the entire database to sift through, how else are you supposed to get the Eircode for an address or look up an Eircode without providing information on what you're looking for?

GJG

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

I don't think that you can get potential customers to key in that sort of information, when you're at first-contact (trying to win the potential customers).
IMO this comes back to the same thing about the Eircode website requiring data entry from end-users and how that's a turn-off. Why should every interaction with Eircode have to be reciprocal? It's a service, not a product.
What they currently have implemented is good for some users, who do want to enter information. It's not as good for passive users who want the information "at-a-glance". Or who don't want to or cannot interact with an online database.

Like plenty of posters before me, I don't understand why this is such a red-line issue. We're not all "wrong" or "haters". It's a pretty simple observation IMO.

The first three chainstore websites that I took of the top of my head in neighbouring countries Carrefour in France, Lidl in Germany and Argos in the UK, had a feature to enter your postcode and find your closest branch. They were either directly linked from their front page, or in most cases actually on their front page.

I don't think that Ireland is such a special snowflake or that conditions are so different; you can assume the same will be installed on Irish websites over time.

plodder

GJG wrote: »

The first three chainstore websites that I took of the top of my head in neighbouring countries Carrefour in France, Lidl in Germany and Argos in the UK, had a feature to enter your postcode and find your closest branch. They were either directly linked from their front page, or in most cases actually on their front page.

I don't think that Ireland is such a special snowflake or that conditions are so different; you can assume the same will be installed on Irish websites over time.

This conversation started out in the context of small businesses though. It was the example of a lock-smith in fact, who came up with this list of postcode areas that they cover. You can't really compare businesses like that with enormous concerns like Carrefour or Lidl, who have huge flexibility and resources at their disposal.

So, rather than Ireland being 'a special snow flake' it's simply a distinction between large businesses and small ones. You would probably find similar small businesses in the UK which cover a limited area, and who just list postcode areas rather than having a query like that on a website. It also remains to be seen how long it takes the Lidls and Argos's to implement it here as well. (7 months later and no sign yet). I also agree with the poster who says forcing people to enter information which they have to go looking for is a turn-off.

marmurr1916

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

I don't think that you can get potential customers to key in that sort of information, when you're at first-contact (trying to win the potential customers).
IMO this comes back to the same thing about the Eircode website requiring data entry from end-users and how that's a turn-off. Why should every interaction with Eircode have to be reciprocal? It's a service, not a product.
What they currently have implemented is good for some users, who do want to enter information. It's not as good for passive users who want the information "at-a-glance". Or who don't want to or cannot interact with an online database.

Like plenty of posters before me, I don't understand why this is such a red-line issue. We're not all "wrong" or "haters". It's a pretty simple observation IMO.

I do it quite often in the UK - loads of websites ask for your postcode so they can provide details of your nearest branch for example.

It takes a couple of seconds to type the postcode into a little box.

Perhaps people in Ireland aren't as familiar with such simple website interactions yet but I don't see why there should be any strong resistance to a website that asks potential customers to enter their Eircode so they can either find out if the company serves their area at all or get information about their nearest branch or whatever.

It seems to me that a lot of posters on this thread don't have experience of living in countries where requests for postcodes are routine and unproblematic.

I'm not sure how entering a simple Eircode (which wouldn't be compulsory anyway - there are other methods available via the UK websites I've used for checking their service areas or finding out branch locations that don't involve use of postcodes) involves 'interacting with a database' in any meaningful sense for a customer, at least not in a way that would bamboozle someone who is able to use the web.

You can choose to type a few characters into a box and the information you're looking for comes up on your screen. If you don't want to enter your Eircode you can probably get the information you're looking for using a map search (f the company's website has this set up) or by browsing through the website to see if there's pages about the company's geographical coverage.

Allowing (not compelling) potential customers to put in their postcode to find out information about the geographical extent and nature of your company's services is not that big a deal really and, with the right software, should be affordable for even very small businesses and could provide them with useful information about where their potential customers live.

As a previous post said, you might end up getting a lot of queries from people with Eircodes that are just outside your existing area of coverage, useful information if you want to consider expanding that area. Even if the Eircodes are within your existing area of coverage, mapping them will allow you to see if there are any particular sub-areas that have a higher rate of queries and for what products/services, which you can assess from how your website is browsed.

Carawaystick

Why would acompany add an eircode lookup when google location services or ip lookup do almost the same job now?

Carawaystick

Why would a company add an eircode lookup when google location services or ip lookup do almost the same job now?

oscarBravo

Carawaystick wrote: »

Why would acompany add an eircode lookup when google location services or ip lookup do almost the same job now?

I just did an IP lookup, and the location it came up with is about 30km from me.

my3cents

marmurr1916 wrote: »

I do it quite often in the UK - loads of websites ask for your postcode so they can provide details of your nearest branch for example.

It takes a couple of seconds to type the postcode into a little box.

Perhaps people in Ireland aren't as familiar with such simple website interactions yet but I don't see why there should be any strong resistance to a website that asks potential customers to enter their Eircode so they can either find out if the company serves their area at all or get information about their nearest branch or whatever.

It seems to me that a lot of posters on this thread don't have experience of living in countries where requests for postcodes are routine and unproblematic.

The UK had its postcode roll out in 1971 and it was very different from the Irish mess. Basically there was loads of advertising and because the Royal Mail were using the postcode for sorting, it was made quite clear that any mail from then on without a postcode could take longer to deliver because it would need to be hand sorted.

What happened here? Here's your postcode but don't worry no one needs to use it.

As a result I think it will take much longer than necessary for the Irish to accept and start using Eircode.

marmurr1916

my3cents wrote: »

The UK had its postcode roll out in 1971 and it was very different from the Irish mess. Basically there was loads of advertising and because the Royal Mail were using the postcode for sorting, it was made quite clear that any mail from then on without a postcode could take longer to deliver because it would need to be hand sorted.

What happened here? Here's your postcode but don't worry no one needs to use it.

As a result I think it will take much longer than necessary for the Irish to accept and start using Eircode.

Once it's on Google Maps its adoption will be much more rapid. People will get used to asking other people for their Eircode instead of asking for detailed directions and that'll spur its adoption for other purposes. We've already seen that it's going to be used by Electric Ireland. Nearly everybody gets an electricity bill regularly so most people are going to be receiving post with their Eircode on it regularly, making it more likely that people will remember it and use it.

marmurr1916

oscarBravo wrote: »

I just did an IP lookup, and the location it came up with is about 30km from me.

IP lookup is useless for me too - it generally puts me about 30 miles (ca. 50km) from where I actually live.

my3cents

marmurr1916 wrote: »

Once it's on Google Maps its adoption will be much more rapid. People will get used to asking other people for their Eircode instead of asking for detailed directions and that'll spur its adoption for other purposes. We've already seen that it's going to be used by Electric Ireland. Nearly everybody gets an electricity bill regularly so most people are going to be receiving post with their Eircode on it regularly, making it more likely that people will remember it and use it.

I support Eircode and think its a good idea but I also think that a big opportunity to promote it when the codes went out was missed.

hans aus dtschl

my3cents wrote: »

I support Eircode and think its a good idea but I also think that a big opportunity to promote it when the codes went out was missed.

Yes this is not about people knocking the design, it's about some of us saying "you know what would be an easy thing to improve now?"

And we get replies like "[you're] not such a special snowflake that..." It's really strange head-in-the-sand stuff.

hans aus dtschl

marmurr1916 wrote: »

I do it quite often in the UK - loads of websites ask for your postcode so they can provide details of your nearest branch for example.

You lost it at this first line.

If you're looking for their nearest branch, it's a vastly different scenario than the small-business locksmith described previously.

Come on, we're not talking about a theoretical scenario here, this is a real-world situation!

And the answer is a simple image of the code areas! Everyone has a vague idea of the counties of Ireland, because they're available in an image.

Think about it, you don't type "Galway" into Google, you go to google maps and move in that direction. When you're really lost, you use the lookup.

Eircode can do exactly the same thing really easily. The map can be free-to-all and teachers can put it up in their classrooms and everything. We're talking about a really simple, virtually no-cost piece of PR here.

Am I really that far in the wrong, or making massively unreasonable demands?

plodder

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

I don't think that you can get potential customers to key in that sort of information, when you're at first-contact (trying to win the potential customers).
IMO this comes back to the same thing about the Eircode website requiring data entry from end-users and how that's a turn-off. Why should every interaction with Eircode have to be reciprocal? It's a service, not a product.
What they currently have implemented is good for some users, who do want to enter information. It's not as good for passive users who want the information "at-a-glance". Or who don't want to or cannot interact with an online database.

or who don't see why you need to provide your own exact address, when searching for more general information about a website. They should only need your rough location not exactly where you live. You might not even be at home at the time. The ideal solution is to offer multiple ways of getting the information, perhaps including queries like that, but it should also include maps and lists of postcode areas. And hierarchical postcodes like the UK's are much better for this, especially when the basic location information is available for free.

You can see how at websites like this one (provided free of charge by some random programmer)

http://www.doogal.co.uk/UKPostcodes.php

You can enter any postcode or partial postcode eg
BT - Northern Ireland
BT21 - the Ards and Donaghadee area
BT21 XXX - some road in the above area

and you will get maps showing the area, and other useful information - all for free. This wouldn't be possible with Eircode for both technical and commercial reasons.

So, in summary I'd say that while support by google maps and satnavs will improve adoption. What will hold it back is:
- the data has to be licensed/paid for, making businesses slower to adopt it, than if it were free
- the random codes are harder to remember
- it's mostly only people in rural areas who have an incentive to actually learn them off

Given that it took decades for people to accept the UK postcode, despite the fact that efficient post delivery depended on it (and I have some sympathy for Eircode on that point), it takes a brave man (or just an anonymous poster on the internet) to make bold predictions about future adoption levels.

Like plenty of posters before me, I don't understand why this is such a red-line issue. We're not all "wrong" or "haters". It's a pretty simple observation IMO.

Indeed.

GJG

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

Yes this is not about people knocking the design, it's about some of us saying "you know what would be an easy thing to improve now?"

And we get replies like "[you're] not such a special snowflake that..." It's really strange head-in-the-sand stuff.

Except that wasn't what was said.

GJG wrote: »

I don't think that Ireland is such a special snowflake or that conditions are so different; you can assume the same will be installed on Irish websites over time.

The claim was made that no business would want or bother with a website postcode branch finder. I provided examples of businesses using it in various other countries, and said that there is no reason to believe that the same won't happen in Ireland.