Eircode discussion

grogi · 02-06-2017 10:16am

oscarBravo wrote: »

The biggest problem Eircode has is that people are still trying to design it long after its implementation.

I won't say much more, because the last time I dared to say anything that wasn't critical of Eircode I was subjected to a sustained campaign of harassment on Twitter by one of its more vocal opponents, and life's too short.

It is what it is. It might not be perfect, but it is not going to be replaced with anything else, so we need to deal with it.

LeinsterDub · 02-06-2017 10:33am

Sam Russell wrote: »

To me Eircode has a problem in that they have chosen too few Routing Codes, 139 instead of about 1,000. They should have used four characters as the routing code, with a level of redundancy to give error detection. They even have a non-contiguous routing code - now try explaining that one.

Using a larger number of routing codes would allow a more uniform spread, with approximately the same number of addresses per code, which would have great benefits for other uses than postal delivery.

Who cares if there is one routing code with 10 houses and a other with 1000 ? It's all sorted by machine anyway.

Sam Russell · 02-06-2017 10:44am

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Who cares if there is one routing code with 10 houses and a other with 1000 ? It's all sorted by machine anyway.

That is exactly the point. The people who care are the statisticians who try to show economic effect by Eircode but cannot do so with any meaning because of the huge variation on routing code. And of course, routing code does not respect and administrative boundaries, like county boundaries.

That is the problem.

MBSnr · 02-06-2017 10:50am

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Who cares if there is one routing code with 10 houses and a other with 1000 ? It's all sorted by machine anyway.

For use online it's an issue. Say I live in H91 (Galway). That's a massive area covered by one routing key. In the UK on most sites you can search by postcode or even partial postcode. I don't want to give my eircode to a website that completely identifies me, but I might want to find services near me (for example).

As other posters have said - What they should have done was broken the keys down further to be four digits for a more granular localised routing with three random last digits. Say Clifden as H901 xyz out to Balinasloe as H9xx xyz or whatever. H9 is Galway county, H9x is West or East etc, H9xy is localised, H9xy xyz is your house...

grogi · 02-06-2017 10:52am

MBSnr wrote: »

For use online it's an issue. Say I live in H91 (Galway). That's a massive area covered by one routing key. In the UK on most sites you can search by postcode or even partial postcode. I don't want to give my eircode to a website that completely identifies me, but I might want to find services near me (for example).

Get real. Websites already know you much much better than you realise.

MBSnr · 02-06-2017 10:58am

grogi wrote: »

Get real. Websites already know you much much better than you realise.

But perhaps not my actual address hey...?

plodder · 02-06-2017 10:58am

grogi wrote: »

It is what it is. It might not be perfect, but it is not going to be replaced with anything else, so we need to deal with it.

True, but part of "dealing with it" means understanding the privacy/data protection implications. Take the CSO stats I linked to. House price data is public information and there is no issue. But, what if it were mental health statistics?

The routing key area where I live has a population of a few hundred people. If someone published mental health stats by RK area, then in many areas (like Galway) it would be completely anonymous, but me and my neighbours could say: "Oh, one case of schizophrenia! That must be Mrs Murphy down the road. Zero cases of bipolar. What about the Jones lad? He must be cured."

I'm not getting a warm feeling that people appreciate the implications of it.

LeinsterDub · 02-06-2017 12:06pm

plodder wrote: »

True, but part of "dealing with it" means understanding the privacy/data protection implications. Take the CSO stats I linked to. House price data is public information and there is no issue. But, what if it were mental health statistics?

MBSnr wrote: »

For use online it's an issue. Say I live in H91 (Galway). That's a massive area covered by one routing key. In the UK on most sites you can search by postcode or even partial postcode. I don't want to give my eircode to a website that completely identifies me, but I might want to find services near me (for example).

So the RK is simultaneously is too big and too small :rolleyes:

plodder · 02-06-2017 1:01pm

LeinsterDub wrote: »

So the RK is simultaneously is too big and too small :rolleyes:

In different cases, yes. There's about 35 different routing keys in Dublin. So, that's good for finding granular property price stats. But, potentially risky for some other kinds of stats. The reverse is true for Galway, with only one routing key for the city and most of the county.

LeinsterDub · 02-06-2017 1:05pm

plodder wrote: »

In different cases, yes. There's about 35 different routing keys in Dublin. So, that's good for finding granular property price stats. But, potentially risky for some other kinds of stats. The reverse is true for Galway, with only one routing key for the city and most of the county.

Well you square that circle because I know no one else can .

MBSnr · 02-06-2017 1:09pm

LeinsterDub wrote: »

So the RK is simultaneously is too big and too small :rolleyes:

People have different viewpoints. Doesn't make your one right though. Rolls eyes sarcastically....

Anyhow - It depends what you do with the information provided. If the routing key was far more granular (as I said) then you could only ask for a portion of it in questionnaires, and the like, to gather statistics. It would provide enough detail to gather measurable and accurate data but not individually identify the person submitting the data.

However they missed that opportunity by choosing an inferior routing key method to (allegedly) gain the support and backing of An Post. Who in turn, might also co-incidentally want to seriously limit the chance of another operator delivering post by using meaningful localised routing codes....

TheChizler · 02-06-2017 1:15pm

I know it's been posted before, but maybe the OSi Small Areas would be a more appropriate measure for looking at these kind of stats.

http://census.cso.ie/popbysa/

They're designed to enable statistics of areas of 50-200 dwellings and can be easily determined from an Eircode lookup. This is something they were specifically designed to do, and can be evaluated against that design requirement. Unlike Eircode, which was not something it was designed to do.

LeinsterDub · 02-06-2017 1:27pm

MBSnr wrote: »

People have different viewpoints. Doesn't make your one right though. Rolls eyes sarcastically....

The point was you can't please everyone all the time. No matter what was chosen people would want something different. Eircode is working and it's not going to be changed now

gizmo555 · 02-06-2017 5:01pm

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Eircode is working

Well, that depends on how you define "working". As the recent Irish Times piece highlighted, it is certainly not working as a postcode.

ukoda · 02-06-2017 5:07pm

gizmo555 wrote: »

Well, that depends on how you define "working". As the recent Irish Times piece highlighted, it is certainly not working as a postcode.

In the U.K. their postcode doesn't help the postman identifiying each house either, there's always a human element

What do people actually want ericode to do?

gizmo555 · 02-06-2017 5:14pm

ukoda wrote: »

What do people actually want ericode to do?

Stop pretending it's a postcode perhaps?

ukoda · 02-06-2017 5:24pm

gizmo555 wrote: »

Stop pretending it's a postcode perhaps?

What exactly is a postcode?

It's defined as:
"a group of numbers or letters and numbers which are added to a postal address to assist the sorting of mail."

If An Post say they use it in their mail centres to sort Mail, Then by definition eircode is a postcode.

However, personally, I don't think it's usefulness has anything to do with post.

Sam Russell · 02-06-2017 7:11pm

As it stands, the heavy lifting for a post code has been done. It can be redesigned at a small cost because of this. For example the current routing keys could be divided into sub divisions one at a time where they are found to be too big. It is done with telephone STD codes and could be done with routing codes easily. For example Q23 could be reassigned to Q33 Q43 and Q53, each relating to a small area of Q23 and Q23 could be retired after a while.

The fact is - every address now has a code that identifies it individually, just as every tax payer has a PPS number. Every passport maps back to a PPS number as does every driving licence.

Eircode will do wonders for tax collection and law enforcement - eventually.

gizmo555 · 02-06-2017 8:16pm

Sam Russell wrote: »

Eircode will do wonders for tax collection and law enforcement - eventually.

And, of course, this is what it's all really about. And, by the way, I'm fully in favour of tax collection and law enforcement.

What I'm not in favour of is the state insulting our intelligence because it doesn't want to admit what it's really up to, much like Paschal Donohue insisting the Public Services Card "isn't mandatory", when without one you won't be able to get a passport, driving licence, or any Social Protection payment including Child Benefit or state pension.

Bray Head · 03-06-2017 6:52am

Sam Russell wrote: »

As it stands, the heavy lifting for a post code has been done. It can be redesigned at a small cost because of this. For example the current routing keys could be divided into sub divisions one at a time where they are found to be too big. It is done with telephone STD codes and could be done with routing codes easily. For example Q23 could be reassigned to Q33 Q43 and Q53, each relating to a small area of Q23 and Q23 could be retired after a while.

That would be madness. The whole point of an eircode is that it is unique and permanent for a given premises. Changes would be a nightmare, People would forget, databases wouldn't get updated and duplicates would hang around systems for years.
Each routing key has 26^2 = 456,976 possible four-digit combinations for endings. There is huge capacity already within the existing routing keys short of building a new city from scratch.
H91 is probably the biggest routing key by population but even that must have no more than 200,000 dwellings and premises in it.
If we ever run into capacity issues - which we won't for a very long time - the logical thing would just be to come up with a new routing key which is contiguous with H91, and assign all new eircodes using it.

byrnefm · 03-06-2017 10:33am

If such changes were restricted to the largest Eircode geographical areas, such as H91, the impact would be much more limited if done now. Royal Mail has changed postcode areas in the past and as Eircodes are not yet in that widespread use yet small changes could work without much fuss.

But this is all hypothetical.. I can't see any changes being made anytime soon...

ukoda · 13-06-2017 10:22am

This is why I've always refuted claims that eircode is no good in an Road accident or non dwelling emergency. It's simply not the right solution to begin with. Far better ways of doing exist.

It's utter nonsense to see the anti eircode crowd using pictures of a chalk body outline on the ground in a field with "eircode can't find you here" as the tag line.

Mobile phones will soon text your exact location to emergency services when you dial 999
http://jrnl.ie/3440742

plodder · 26-06-2017 11:46am

ukoda wrote: »

... the anti eircode crowd ...

Minor point, but you are talking about an individual there - not a crowd.

Just to return to the point made earlier about using OSI small area codes for property statistics. I'm sure that would be a useful thing to do, but it requires (direct or indirect) access to the Eircode database, which costs money etc etc and the fact that small area codes themselves are not publicly known identifiers limits their casual use.

You can publish a set of property stats by routing key, purely from information in the public domain (the property price register itself). And people can relate the stats to their own address, simply by checking their own Eircode. That is why routing keys will continue to be used for some statistics.

There's another amusing example of how the limited amount of public information in Eircodes finds unexpected uses, in this article in the Times

Finally, though, I have come across the definitive argument that proves the system has been worth every cent of the €38m it cost. Using Eircode, you can find out whether a person or estate agent is trying to aggrandise their address. It’s useful if you live in Dublin. You can find out that the house on Grand Canal Street Lower isn’t in Dublin 4, it’s in Dublin 2, or expose the person with notions who turns their Dublin 11 Glasnevin address into Dublin 9. We all know them.

Useful in Dublin, less so elsewhere.

grogi · 26-06-2017 11:50am

plodder wrote: »

Finally, though, I have come across the definitive argument that proves the system has been worth every cent of the €38m it cost. Using Eircode, you can find out whether a person or estate agent is trying to aggrandise their address. It’s useful if you live in Dublin. You can find out that the house on Grand Canal Street Lower isn’t in Dublin 4, it’s in Dublin 2, or expose the person with notions who turns their Dublin 11 Glasnevin address into Dublin 9. We all know them.

Useful in Dublin, less so elsewhere.

What is the difference anyway? Postal district snobbery, nothing else.

pluto_322 · 19-11-2023 10:14pm

Eventhough this thread is old, I'm wondering if someone might be help with our holiday home issue. It's eircode has been 'Deactivated.'

We still pay property tax and use the property frequently.

Only found out about 'deactivation' in recent weeks when seeking competitive quotes for holiday home insurance. Most Insurers wont quote without 'active' eircode.

What should we do next?

Citrus_8 · 19-11-2023 10:24pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121389466#Comment_121389466

Just contact them to activate your Eircode.

https://www.eircode.ie/contact

Ronald Binge Redux · 21-11-2023 2:36pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/103910111#Comment_103910111

They really should have taken the opportunity to turn Dublin 6W back into its originally intended D26 - 6W only came about because some had conniptions about Templeogue being in a seemingly logical sequence after Palmerstown, Clondalkin and Tallaght.

Eircode discussion

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