Eircode - its implemetation (merged)

a) Would it really be such a problem if the emergency services arrive at a location 100 metres away?

If my child is trapped under a tractor, I don't want the emergency services arriving at my neighbour's house, getting out of their vehicles, then back in again once they've realised they're at the wrong location, before getting to my house.

What happens if adjoining sequential Eircodes were separated by a physical barrier, like bollards or some other barrier dividing up a street?

The street I live on is partly pedestrianised and there are bollards at either end of the pedestrianised section.

If people try to get to my house simply using the UK postcode, they often either end up on the main road around the corner, or at the other end of the same street but blocked by the bollards on the pedestrianised section from driving up the street to my house. Getting around the bollards requires them to drive out of the other end of my street, turn right, then right again onto the main road, then up the main road for a couple of hundred metres, then right again into a side street that has a junction with the main road, and right again to get to the into the correct end of my street.

A friend who lives nearby has a similar problem. There are three house numbers, including his, that are out of sequence with the rest of the houses on the street. This means that his house, number 69, and two more houses, 70 and 71, are at the opposite end of the street from number 67 and 68, with the street divided by a small landscaped area with flower beds. If a delivery van goes to number 67, expecting to find 69 next door, they'll be at the wrong end of the street and unable to drive to his end without leaving the street, going around the corner and driving up the lane at the rear, then turning another corner to enter the street at his end.

b) The benefit only applies to non unique addresses and the generally accepted figure for these is 35%. It does not apply to urban areas where addresses are unique and eircodes can be used to validate addresses without error. Why impose the limited advantage of this feature on the 65% majority? Why not have them random in rural areas and sequential in urban areas?

There are two houses with the address: 2 Watergate Street, Bandon, Co. Cork. One example I have personal knowledge of which shows that not all urban addresses are unique. In any case, I can only imagine the howls of derision if it had been decided that Ireland should have two separate postcode systems.

clewbays wrote: »

sondagefaux wrote: »

And finally, how Waterford Council is implementing Eircodes:

... 8o-90% of cases reported to the council have a location component.

Are you saying 80% to 90% of cases reported included an Eircode or do you mean things like a street name, or a park name etc. because it is very hard to understand how even 80% of incidents would be directly linked to a postal address?

I'm not saying anything. I quoted a tweet concerning a presentation given by a representative of Waterford Council, who said that 80% - 90% of issues reported to them had a location component. Presumably they can ask for Eircodes when someone reports an issue at or near their address, or get it from a database when the person gives their address.

antoinolachtnai

GJG wrote: »

It's not clear what your issue is here, but the examples you give certainly back up my point. Sam was making the case for sequential codes, and I pointed out that even if it was possible (it's not) it would lead to properties with near-identical, or actually identical addresses having near-identical codes, and that would give obvious scope for confusion.

I pointed out that Eircodes are not assigned randomly; care is taken to make sure that addresses with similar Eircodes have starkly different addresses, and vice versa. The examples you give bear this out.

I am glad you took the time to look up all those addresses.

It just seems that there was a very complicated endeavour to do this, but it is by no means guaranteed to work (which eircode admits) and it causes a lot of problems. (There is no detailed documentation of the method to do this either.)

I don't see the great advantage of this, and as far as I can tell no detailed research that was done on it.

I'd be a lot more confident in the scheme if it were just published. It is hard to see why it isn't just published now, seeing as it is being given away largely for free (well, 50c/1000 requests, which is almost free) on Google anyway.

It is great to say that this is a better system than a normal postcode where each area has a code and each individual house has an individual code, but this wasn't evaluated in any depth and it certainly wasn't consulted upon.

If someone has a subjective view that it's a good system, then that's fine. But that's all it is, a subjective view. There is no point calling people 'biased' because they don't agree with a subjective view.

Where are you getting the figure of 16000? Are you suggesting that almost one per cent of the letters were misdelivered?

Yes. As i understand it, that is a pretty typical mis-delivery rate or non-delivery rate for fairly straightforward uniquely addressed mail. For non-unique addresses I'd expect the figure to be higher. The burden is really on eircode to produce figures and justify how they ensured codes were distributed correctly, not on me. But of course there are no figures.

Don't you think that the people getting them would have been alerted by someone else's name on the envelope?

What proportion of envelopes had the incorrect name on the envelope? What database was this name-picking exercise based on?And what about the problems with similar personal names in rural areas? What verification was carried out on the accuracy of the database or on the accuracy of the deliveries?

As far as I know, no one knows the answer to any of these questions.

And in any case, it is trivially easy to verify it on the Eircode map.

It actually isn't. It is easy if a person has Internet access in their rural abode, knows how to work a computer well, and knows how to read a map. These are are not the sorts of people who typically have trouble directing an ambulance.

plodder wrote: »

Don't have time to deal with all of this, but I just want to make this point.

You don't seem to understand. These are unique addresses. The corresponding eircodes are also unique. You have two unique pieces of information to cross reference. It is highly unlikely that you would make the corresponding mistake in both pieces of information. I've explained this to you before.

As PD Verse pointed out, 'unique' addresses aren't always that unique.

I think you are misunderstanding how a disaster occurs. It's not something that happens when something goes wrong. Things go wrong all the time, in nuclear plants, aircraft, ambulance services. Mostly they have no consequences, because of redundancy.

A disaster is what happens when many things go wrong in very specific ways. And you are absolutely right that the scenario outlined is highly unlikely. All disasters are highly unlikely, but they still happen sometimes.

You seem to be hung up on some very personal way you would use to remember sequential codes. I've never heard of anyone else primarily using their neighbour's phone number or code or the like to triangulate and thereby remember their own. I suppose it might not be just you, but I'm willing to bet that it is so rare that it doesn't remotely justify removing a whole layer of redundancy that is important for avoiding confusion.

plodder wrote: »

Don't have time to deal with all of this, but I just want to make this point.

You don't seem to understand. These are unique addresses. The corresponding eircodes are also unique. You have two unique pieces of information to cross reference. It is highly unlikely that you would make the corresponding mistake in both pieces of information. I've explained this to you before.

If you have an Eircode and and Address that are similar, how can you tell which one is correct? You can't. With the Eircode design you can detect if the Address or the Eircode is incorrect.

There is a reason why Emergency services implement a best practice policy of asking for related information independently. In high stress situations the person reporting their Eircode may agree that each of the addresses below are correct for their Eircode.

8 Silver Birches, Dunboyne, Meath
8 Silver Birches Crescent, Dunboyne, Meath
8 Silver Birches, Navan, Meath

I'm not going to debate exactly how often it might occur, because that's a ridiculous argument.

Not everyone implements best practice. If I'm a delivery driver or providing a service and I enter the Eircode at the end of the address it is highly likely I won't recognise the error as I'll be concentrating on the first part of the address which looks correct.

If I'm in a customer care call centre and I'm trying to take address information quickly I may call out just "ok that's 8 Silver Birches correct" to the caller to verify the address.

If I'm entering my Eircode on my mobile and it autofills the address I may not notice the address is incorrect because I'm concentrating on the first part of the address.

During testing we allocated Eircodes randomly and then tested how many similar addresses were also assigned similar Eircodes. The result was 7%

Don't have time to deal with all of this, but I just want to make this point.

GJG wrote: »

That's flat wrong. It depends on what you call non-unique, the 35 per cent refers to absolutely no difference between the addresses; but there is still plenty of scope for confusion between 110 High Street and 101 High Street.

You don't seem to understand. These are unique addresses. The corresponding eircodes are also unique. You have two unique pieces of information to cross reference. It is highly unlikely that you would make the corresponding mistake in both pieces of information. I've explained this to you before.

PDVerse wrote: »

Bias Alert: Because obviously every location within 100m of a house is in direct line of sight.

You have to remember one code, no more. The first three characters are the same as your neighbours. That leaves 4 characters. Remembering 4 unique characters is not a difficult challenge, so yes the advantages far outweigh the "alleged" disadvantages.

Bias Alert.

It doesn't really further the discussion much by saying that, does it?

What if the whole code bore a direct relationship to your neighbour's? Would that not make it easier to remember again?

You don't appear to understand the logical conclusion of your own argument.

No idea what your point is.

This isn't 1972. Eircodes are entered on websites, provided to people who put them into CRM systems etc. The IT systems translate the data into usable, actionable data suitable for each use. For most private citizens that's simply entering into Google Maps and getting directions. For businesses it can be assigning to the correct Engineering area or Sales Territory, or Delivery Depot. None of that is done by staring at the code.

Sure, and for most of the people at your conference, I'm sure Eircode is a genuine success, but it still depends on widespread public acceptance.

We're in the implementation thread, and I can state from my experience that none of the implementations I've been involved with have raised this as an issue. SUSI had a 92% Eircode rate on their forms (yes they were validated, no, people didn't just enter anything) so in the real world the last four characters of the Eircode do not present an issue.

When evidence challenges your assumptions you are meant to change your mind.

There's a big difference between the examples (NAS vs SUSI). For SUSI, you have the citizen with plenty of time to make the application, eager to be as compliant as possible, vs a panic stricken situation trying to recall information. They could hardly be more different.

plodder wrote: »

You have to weigh up the supposed advantages of this system with the difficulty in remembering essentially random codes. And that's before we get into the whole proprietary database vs geocode debate.

What on Earth are you talking about?

My neighbour's phone number is totally different to mine. Are you seriously saying that some magical force would help me remember my phone number better if it were in sequence with hers?

plodder wrote: »

You are exaggerating the benefit of this "feature".

a) Would it really be such a problem if the emergency services arrive at a location 100 metres away?

Yes, a miss is as good as a mile if you are dying of a heart attack at a house 100m away from the ambulance who have no way to locate you. But look at the addresses, like SHANKILL, CAVAN. That is more than 100m across. I am personally familiar with warrens of rural roads, several kms in diameter, all with identical addresses.

Are you seriously suggesting that, in addition, giving them almost-identical Eircodes would have been a good idea?

plodder wrote: »

b) The benefit only applies to non unique addresses and the generally accepted figure for these is 35%. It does not apply to urban areas where addresses are unique and eircodes can be used to validate addresses without error.

That's flat wrong. It depends on what you call non-unique, the 35 per cent refers to absolutely no difference between the addresses; but there is still plenty of scope for confusion between 110 High Street and 101 High Street.

In many cities there are streets officially called Upper / Lower / East / West / North / South / Great / Little (say) George's Street, all of which are referred to popularly just as George's Street. Eircode is set up to make sure that none of those have easily-confused codes. If you genuinely can't see the point in that, there isn't much more to say.

plodder wrote: »

Why impose the limited advantage of this feature on the 65% majority? Why not have them random in rural areas and sequential in urban areas?

You are imagining that it is even possible to keep codes sequential. What happens when a building is demolished and an apartment block is built in its place? You would quickly end up with the most confusing option, a partially sequential code. Have you ever tried to find a house on a street where some houses don't yet use the 'new' numbers, introduced 50 years ago or more? And what do you do when a rural area is urbanised?

And if you could overcome all of these issues of such a dog's dinner, and cope with confusion of multiple overlapping systems, why would you bother? What possible benefit are you pursuing?

oscarBravo

plodder wrote: »

...the difficulty in remembering essentially random codes....

...is a fiction. Mobile phone numbers are essentially random codes. People remember their phone numbers.

plodder wrote: »

I related an example a while ago of where I found an ambulance about a mile away from its destination. Had they been within 100metres there wouldn't be a problem as they'd have seen someone frantically waving from the front door.

Bias Alert: Because obviously every location within 100m of a house is in direct line of sight.

plodder wrote: »

You have to weigh up the supposed advantages of this system with the difficulty in remembering essentially random codes. And that's before we get into the whole proprietary database vs geocode debate.

Again. Why implement it across the spectrum and not just in rural areas where the benefit was to be had?

You have to remember one code, no more. The first three characters are the same as your neighbours. That leaves 4 characters. Remembering 4 unique characters is not a difficult challenge, so yes the advantages far outweigh the "alleged" disadvantages.

plodder wrote: »

We're talking about Eircode here, not some hypothetical hierarchical code and the random part of Eircode, is where these errors could occur

You don't appear to understand the logical conclusion of your own argument.

plodder wrote: »

It would be interesting to find out what percentage of calls NAS gets with Eircodes. If they were easier to remember then I suspect the number would be higher.

This isn't 1972. Eircodes are entered on websites, provided to people who put them into CRM systems etc. The IT systems translate the data into usable, actionable data suitable for each use. For most private citizens that's simply entering into Google Maps and getting directions. For businesses it can be assigning to the correct Engineering area or Sales Territory, or Delivery Depot. None of that is done by staring at the code.

We're in the implementation thread, and I can state from my experience that none of the implementations I've been involved with have raised this as an issue. SUSI had a 92% Eircode rate on their forms (yes they were validated, no, people didn't just enter anything) so in the real world the last four characters of the Eircode do not present an issue.

When evidence challenges your assumptions you are meant to change your mind.

PDVerse wrote: »

Are you seriously asking this question? Have we reached the "jump the shark" moment of anti-Eircode bias where an argument can be made that ambulances turning up at the wrong location isn't a big deal?

I related an example a while ago of where I found an ambulance about a mile away from its destination. Had they been within 100metres there wouldn't be a problem as they'd have seen someone frantically waving from the front door.

You have to weigh up the supposed advantages of this system with the difficulty in remembering essentially random codes. And that's before we get into the whole proprietary database vs geocode debate.

Yes, it is more beneficial to all of rural Ireland. Non unique addresses were a priority of the design.

Again. Why implement it across the spectrum and not just in rural areas where the benefit was to be had?

I always recognise the "if you make a small mistake with a hierarchical code you will be close to your intended destination" argument as an indicator of bias. You have to be completely biased to assume that the error in the Eircode will be in the last or second last character rather than the fourth or fifth character. How far away will you be then?

We're talking about Eircode here, not some hypothetical hierarchical code and the random part of Eircode, is where these errors could occur

I do not think a design feature that assistes the National Ambulance Service to respond to an emergency faster is a "limited advantage".

It would be interesting to find out what percentage of calls NAS gets with Eircodes. If they were easier to remember then I suspect the number would be higher.

plodder wrote: »

You are exaggerating the benefit of this "feature".

a) Would it really be such a problem if the emergency services arrive at a location 100 metres away?

Are you seriously asking this question? Have we reached the "jump the shark" moment of anti-Eircode bias where an argument can be made that ambulances turning up at the wrong location isn't a big deal?

plodder wrote: »

b) The benefit only applies to non unique addresses and the generally accepted figure for these is 35%. It does not apply to urban areas where addresses are unique and eircodes can be used to validate addresses without error. Why impose the limited advantage of this feature on the 65% majority? Why not have them random in rural areas and sequential in urban areas?

Yes, it is more beneficial to all of rural Ireland. Non unique addresses were a priority of the design.

I always recognise the "if you make a small mistake with a hierarchical code you will be close to your intended destination" argument as an indicator of bias. You have to be completely biased to assume that the error in the Eircode will be in the last or second last character rather than the fourth or fifth character. How far away will you be then?

I do not think a design feature that assists the National Ambulance Service to respond to an emergency faster is a "limited advantage".

clewbays wrote: »

Are you saying 80% to 90% of cases reported included an Eircode or do you mean things like a street name, or a park name etc. because it is very hard to understand how even 80% of incidents would be directly linked to a postal address?

Looking at the slide, I'd estimate that about a third of the categories could be assumed to always link to an Eircode. For the others, some of the time they might, but in general they wouldn't.

clewbays

PDVerse wrote: »

80% to 90% of cases reported are related to a location, a subset of those relate to houses or activities outside houses. The ECAD database contains spatial information (centre point and bounding boxes) for Streets, Townlands, etc. so this information about an address is useful to Waterford even if an actual Eircode isn't available or suitable.

Thanks so presumably it was Waterford local authority staff who enhanced the original incident information with geocoded location coding. More of that type of getting on with it attitude is needed if usage levels are going to significantly increase.

GJG wrote: »

You are precisely incorrect with this.

Let's leave aside the impossibility of keeping a system sequential (and dealing with the inevitable confusion caused by a partially sequential system).

Stressed communications are prone to error, and stark differences are important to avoid this. If your address was only one or two characters different to your neighbour, (remember that 40 per cent of people have an identical address to their neighbours, and most of the rest have only a single character difference). then the potential for undetected error is very high. You can never prevent all errors, the point is to make sure that errors are evident.

999 operators are trained to then ask first for the code, then for the address, even though they can see it on their screen once they enter the code. If the code is wrongly communicated, redundancy means a 99 per cent chance that it will be immediately evident, and the operator can ask for clarification. But if you give an incorrect Eircode that, by chance, is the correct Eircode for somewhere else, that will be instantly evident when you state your address.

This happens because, contrary to you umpteenth restatement of the false claim that Eircode is random, it isn't. It is designed to make sure that no two addresses which are identical or even similar (even if they aren't physically close) have even remotely similar Eircodes.

Under your suggested system, a small communication error could give a nearly-correct code, which resolved to an address, say 100m away, around a corner.

You are exaggerating the benefit of this "feature".

a) Would it really be such a problem if the emergency services arrive at a location 100 metres away?

b) The benefit only applies to non unique addresses and the generally accepted figure for these is 35%. It does not apply to urban areas where addresses are unique and eircodes can be used to validate addresses without error. Why impose the limited advantage of this feature on the 65% majority? Why not have them random in rural areas and sequential in urban areas?

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

Well, for me, in Dublin 2, a house that has a similar eircode (one digit different) is just around the corner, maybe 200m away as the crow flies.

There are plenty of these. Another example (not my house) is D02 C656 and D02 C653.

There are similar-ish things in rural areas. Just from a quick look H12 PK30 and H12 PK03 are both in issue and are not a terribly long distance from each other. H12 PK30, H12 PK31, H12 PK37 and H12 PK38 are all in issue. Perhaps there is a meanness about letter-use in the Cavan area? (That was unfair.)

In a rural setting, there is no quality assurance done (that I know of) to ensure that the correct eircode has been delivered to the correct house. There is a very high probability indeed that over 16000 houses have not received their eircode or have received the wrong one, or multiple eircodes.

What we have is a code that is highly granular, but that is not known to be particularly accurate.

This is easy to see from Google Maps. (Now that these codes are going to be publicly available, largely for free on Google Maps, it is hard to understand why Eircode doesn't just publish the file. )

It's not clear what your issue is here, but the examples you give certainly back up my point. Sam was making the case for sequential codes, and I pointed out that even if it was possible (it's not) it would lead to properties with near-identical, or actually identical addresses having near-identical codes, and that would give obvious scope for confusion.

I pointed out that Eircodes are not assigned randomly; care is taken to make sure that addresses with similar Eircodes have starkly different addresses, and vice versa. The examples you give bear this out.

H12 PK30 SHANKILL, CAVAN

H12 PK03 KADONA TIRLAHODE, STRADONE, CO. CAVAN

H12 PK37 BRUSKEY, CARRIGAN, CO. CAVAN

H12 PK38 DRUMALT, ARVA, CO. CAVAN
and...

D02 C653 11-13 SUFFOLK STREET, DUBLIN 2

D02 C656 15 CASTLE MARKET, DUBLIN 2
There is a chance, however remote, that under stress, a caller would miscommunicate one of those codes to a 999 operator and the operator would understand an incorrect but valid code. In Sam's suggestion, that wrong code - giving the wrong location - could still resolve to the same address (say, Shankill, Cavan, that's the whole address) but still be hundreds of meters or even several kms away.

As Eircode is designed, similar Eircodes never refer to similar or identical addresses, as your examples illustrate, eliminating this risk.

There is a very high probability indeed that over 16000 houses have not received their eircode or have received the wrong one, or multiple eircodes.

Where are you getting the figure of 16000? Are you suggesting that almost one per cent of the letters were misdelivered? Don't you think that the people getting them would have been alerted by someone else's name on the envelope? And in any case, it is trivially easy to verify it on the Eircode map.

clewbays wrote: »

Are you saying 80% to 90% of cases reported included an Eircode or do you mean things like a street name, or a park name etc. because it is very hard to understand how even 80% of incidents would be directly linked to a postal address?

80% to 90% of cases reported are related to a location, a subset of those relate to houses or activities outside houses. The ECAD database contains spatial information (centre point and bounding boxes) for Streets, Townlands, etc. so this information about an address is useful to Waterford even if an actual Eircode isn't available or suitable.

clewbays

sondagefaux wrote: »

And finally, how Waterford Council is implementing Eircodes:

... 8o-90% of cases reported to the council have a location component.

Are you saying 80% to 90% of cases reported included an Eircode or do you mean things like a street name, or a park name etc. because it is very hard to understand how even 80% of incidents would be directly linked to a postal address?

oscarBravo

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

Well, for me, in Dublin 2, a house that has a similar eircode (one digit different) is just around the corner, maybe 200m away as the crow flies.

There are plenty of these. Another example (not my house) is D02 C656 and D02 C653.

The first of those is 15 Castle Market; the second is 11-13 Suffolk Street.

There are similar-ish things in rural areas. Just from a quick look H12 PK30 and H12 PK03 are both in issue and are not a terribly long distance from each other.

When a customer contacts us and gives us their Eircode, we then ask them for their address to confirm. If someone told us their Eircode was H12PK30, and then told us their address was in Stradone, Co Cavan, it would be immediately obvious that the Eircode was wrong.

What we have is a code that is highly granular, but that is not known to be particularly accurate.

We've looked up over three thousand Eircodes so far. None have been inaccurate, that I'm aware of.

Now, that's anecdotal, and doesn't mean that there are no inaccuracies in the database. But I think it's fair to say that we have reason to have a great deal of faith in the system.

And finally, how Waterford Council is implementing Eircodes:
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Autoaddress [/font]
[ltr]autoaddress[/ltr]
[font=Arial, sans-serif] 12h12 hours ago[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]John Hawkins from @WaterfordCounci explaining how #Eircode helps them efficiently deliver their services.

[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Autoaddress [ltr]@autoaddress[/ltr] 12h12 hours ago[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]8o-90% of cases reported to the council have a location component. #Eircode

[/font]

Some more examples of Eircode implementation:
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Autoaddress [ltr]@autoaddress[/ltr] 11h11 hours ago[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]#Eircode saved 2,666 hours for SUSI in the last 6 months.

Richard Cantwell [ltr]@ManAboutCouch[/ltr] 13h13 hours agoDublin City, Ireland
Feargal O'Neill from @Gamma_irl up now, talking about Eircode in the Insurance sector, lots of use cases.

[/font]

The video above, plus what's in this post, are some examples of how Eircodes are being implemented in different ways to offer innovative services or improve existing services:

[font=Arial, sans-serif]Richard Cantwell [/font]
[ltr]ManAboutCouch[/ltr]
[font=Arial, sans-serif] 12h12 hours agoDublin City, Ireland[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Automatically detect if an address is an apartment and offer delivery options based on that. Innovative thinking from @NightlineIRL #eircode

[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]bonkers.ie [/font]
[ltr]bonkers_ie[/ltr]
[font=Arial, sans-serif] 8h8 hours agoIreland[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Really enjoyed speaking at today's #Eircode conference! Check out how we implemented @autoaddress here http://www.bonkers.ie/compare-tv-broadband-phone/?utm_campaign=broadband&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_content=28102016 @Eircode

Autoaddress [/font]
[ltr]autoaddress[/ltr]
[font=Arial, sans-serif] 10h10 hours ago
#Eircode key partnership with National Ambulance Service helping to send responders to emergencies faster.

[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Autoaddress [ltr]@autoaddress[/ltr] 11h11 hours ago[/font]
[font=Arial, sans-serif]Massive improvements for @bonkers_ie due to #Eircode

[/font]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfsyeSJ3vyk

antoinolachtnai

Well, for me, in Dublin 2, a house that has a similar eircode (one digit different) is just around the corner, maybe 200m away as the crow flies.

There are plenty of these. Another example (not my house) is D02 C656 and D02 C653.

There are similar-ish things in rural areas. Just from a quick look H12 PK30 and H12 PK03 are both in issue and are not a terribly long distance from each other. H12 PK30, H12 PK31, H12 PK37 and H12 PK38 are all in issue. Perhaps there is a meanness about letter-use in the Cavan area? (That was unfair.)

In a rural setting, there is no quality assurance done (that I know of) to ensure that the correct eircode has been delivered to the correct house. There is a very high probability indeed that over 16000 houses have not received their eircode or have received the wrong one, or multiple eircodes.

What we have is a code that is highly granular, but that is not known to be particularly accurate.

This is easy to see from Google Maps. (Now that these codes are going to be publicly available, largely for free on Google Maps, it is hard to understand why Eircode doesn't just publish the file. )

clewbays

GreenFolder2 wrote: »

Surely you could just have a PO BOX like
PO BOX 2345
Cork T23 XXXX

The Eircode files are limited to entries in GeoDirectory and that does not include post boxes. Similarly a new building will only get into ECAD/ECAF after it has been added to GeoDirectory.

GreenFolder2

Surely you could just have a PO BOX like

PO BOX 2345
Cork T23 XXXX

If the first three chars roughly equate to a delivery area it's straight forward enough.
I'm not really seeing how this is an issue.

An Post aren't the only provider of PO BOX facilities either. So baking it into the system isn't really logical.

Biggest issue with implementation should be an ability to shorten addresses. It's a bit silly repeating info.

12 Main Street
Ballinea L11 X1Y1

Should be enough. It's more accurate than ANY European system.

I don't see any reason for keeping things so verbose. You should just need Street or top couple of lines of rural / bonkers urban address to instruct the delivery person and eircode should be sorting to the route.

Once it's phased in fully we should be able to shorten addresses.

oscarBravo

byrnefm wrote: »

If an Apartment can have an Eircode to help with addressing.. why not PO Boxes, to aid with address verification?

I don't know. Maybe because of the sheer number of PO boxes there may be in a busy DSU?

I know that all the companies in the office building where my company is located share a single Eircode.

byrnefm

oscarBravo wrote: »

So... PO boxes have no Eircode, apart from the Eircode of the DSU where they are located. Which is a bit like saying that the mailbox on the pillar outside my house has no Eircode, but if I was feeling really enthusiastic I could use the Eircode of my house instead.

I believe he may be right on the An Post note- I had a printed reply envelope for An Post, from An Post, to a PO Box number - I think it was for a Savings Cert form - which also included the Eircode D01 F5P2 in the same address with the PO Box.

If an Apartment can have an Eircode to help with addressing.. why not PO Boxes, to aid with address verification?