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Eircodes, why do some courier companies not use them?

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    #122
    Franz Von Peppercorn II
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,398 ✭✭✭Franz Von Peppercorn II


    Nobelium wrote: »
    The only idiot is the one that believes a simple grid reference format for a location, needs to be encrypted so they can gouge a charge for it.

    Eircode works, but only with costly conditions and work arounds.

    I didn’t say anything about encryption. It’s a lookup key. Fairly common. The url you type in to get to boards is mapped to an IP address. It doesn’t encapsulate an IP address so it can work offline.

    Eircode is shorter than Loc8, and better. More memorable - particularly in the Dublin post codes where I have to learn just 4 digits. Only in Ireland would people complain about this.


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    #123
    dxhound2005
    Registered Users Posts: 20,793 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    Most countries seem to use a code consisting only of digits. Probably understandable because trying to use the UK system (linked to a city name) would fail big time in places like America and China. Ours is a bit of an outlier as well, but anyone who struggles with remembering 7 characters, must have a hard time with telephone numbers. It's easy enough to write things down, or record them on a mobile phone.

    http://www.geopostcodes.com/resources


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    #124
    recedite
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    Franz Von Peppercorn II wrote: »
    I didn’t say anything about encryption. It’s a lookup key. Fairly common. The url you type in to get to boards is mapped to an IP address. It doesn’t encapsulate an IP address so it can work offline.
    Boards.ie does not work for me when I'm offline.


    One extra digit for Loc 8 but it contains a huge amount of info.

    Eircode probably only needed 4 or 5 digits for what it does. The first 3 are simply to boast about which Dublin postal area you live in. If you don't live in Dublin, you get 3 meaningless digits at the start.


    Other advantages, for example with a loc 8 code if you want to disclose your general area but not your exact location (eg for car insurance) you can decide to disclose only the first 3 digits. Which actually means something; it refers to a 3.5km square grid around your house.
    Or use the first 6 digits, and define a more exact 100m square grid.
    And the codes are concatenated, which means your neighbour's code is almost the same, whereas with eircodes, they are only random numbers.


    Loc 8 can also be used to identify a harbour, a fishing pier, or a forest carpark... anything.
    Eircode can only locate what is already listed on their database.


    Anyway, we are where we are. We picked the worse system, and we paid through the nose for it. And we will keep paying, in perpetuity.


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    #125
    ILoveYourVibes
    Registered Users Posts: 15,176 ✭✭✭✭ILoveYourVibes


    An post doesn't use them for local deliveries.


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    #126
    dxhound2005
    Registered Users Posts: 20,793 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    ILoveYourVibes wrote: »
    An post doesn't use them for local deliveries.

    No need to. Unless some cranks decide to post letters to themselves with only the Eircode as the address.


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    #127
    gctest50
    Registered Users Posts: 9,605 ✭✭✭gctest50


    recedite wrote: »
    No he offered it to the state, so the state would have owned it.
    There would be no charges to anybody after that.
    He'd have been taken on as management/consultant, so he'd have been on the pigs back. But no more than any other high level civil service executive.


    Consultant for what ?


    Openpostcost, free as can be,

    works offline, even with a pen and paper if you like that sort of thing


    From coordinates to OpenPostcode:

    base10to25(base25to10(base10to5(int((55.5-53.349795)/4.2*390625))))*5 + base10to25(base25to10(int((10.75-6.260254)/5.4*390625))))) = "EAIONL59"

    Take away vowels etc by swapping the base 25 "0...9, A...N" character set

    for "6789B5NPQC4MXRD3LWTF2KJHG"

    ( so you don't accidently end up with words)

    and you get "D4TGHK5C"






    From OpenPostcode to coordinates:

    For "D4TGHK5C"

    swap the character set

    "6789B5NPQC4MXRD3LWTF2KJHG" for regular base 25 "0...9, A...N".

    base10to5(base25to10("EAIONL59"))="2420334443411014"

    Taking alternating characters:
    55.5-(base5to10("22344411")+.5)/390625*4.2 = 53.349798912

    (base5to10("40343104")+.5)/390625*5.4 -10.75 = -6.260248192

    .


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    #128
    janfebmar
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,424 ✭✭✭janfebmar


    Stovepipe wrote: »
    Loc8 code was designed by a member of the Naval Service and offered to the State for free, primarily as a search and rescue location code and it happens to work perfectly with housing and business premises, long before Eircode did and it was in use in the popular GPS systems long before Eircode. I have used it for parcel deliveries and it works just fine. It also works for random locations, which Eircode can't do. Eircode is not as user friendly as UK postcodes, which has been in service for decades.


    The post office here does not use it, so if its not good enough for them, why did the government spend tens of millions on it, rather than implement a better post code system.
    ILoveYourVibes wrote: »
    An post doesn't use them for local deliveries.

    Or for non-local deliveries. Says it all. Neither do some courier drivers.


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    #129
    ytpe2r5bxkn0c1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 32,688 ✭✭✭✭ytpe2r5bxkn0c1


    janfebmar wrote: »
    The post office here does not use it, so if its not good enough for them, why did the government spend tens of millions on it, rather than implement a better post code system.



    Or for non-local deliveries. Says it all. Neither do some courier drivers.
    Because it was never intended for use by an Post, nor did they need it. They have their own means of getting an addressed item to the recipient. Eircode is doing exactly what it was intended to do, and is doing it rather well. Every single courier calling to our deeply rural address now uses it and all deliveries arrive hassle free thanks to Eircode. The driver say it's great. We've yet to encounter a courier not using it.


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    #130
    janfebmar
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,424 ✭✭✭janfebmar


    Gerardo Large Suicide wrote: »
    Because it was never intended for use by an Post, nor did they need it.

    First postal addressing system in the world officially not used by the national post office in that country and their fleet of delivery vehicles / an post couriers etc


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    #131
    ytpe2r5bxkn0c1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 32,688 ✭✭✭✭ytpe2r5bxkn0c1


    janfebmar wrote: »
    First postal addressing system in the world officially not used by the national post office in that country and their fleet of delivery vehicles / an post couriers etc
    Only, it isn't a postal addressing system: it's stated intention is"Eircode enables people and businesses to find every address in Ireland." Which is what it does.


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    #132
    janfebmar
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,424 ✭✭✭janfebmar


    Gerardo Large Suicide wrote: »
    Only, it isn't a postal addressing system: it's stated intention is"Eircode enables people and businesses to find every address in Ireland."
    Its a post code system. Which even the professional and biggest organization in the post delivery system does not use. Only in Ireland.

    Most of the postal code systems worldwide are numeric; only a few are alphanumeric (i.e., use both letters and digits).


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    #133
    astrofool
    Registered Users Posts: 16,496 ✭✭✭✭astrofool


    janfebmar wrote: »
    Its a post code system. Which even the professional and biggest organization in the post delivery system does not use. Only in Ireland.

    Most of the postal code systems worldwide are numeric; only a few are alphanumeric (i.e., use both letters and digits).

    an post blocked post/eir codes for years as it removed their last mile monopoly on delivery in Ireland, they have their own internal system which they still use. Eircodes allow other companies to compete on an even playing field.

    Eircodes are purposely not sequential, aside from the problems of properties being added later on, it means that the combination of address + Eircode acting as an error check, means it should be impossible to make a wrong delivery, as they won't match, and the courier will have to make a phone call to the destination to ensure correct delivery, if it was sequential, then the neighbour 10 houses down could get it, and no one would know there was a problem.


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    #134
    glack
    Registered Users Posts: 695 ✭✭✭glack


    Eircodes are invaluable in rural Ireland. All couriers are using them - rarely get a phone call looking for directions, just phone calls checking we'll be there to sign for something.

    Extra valuable in emergencies. My mother thought they were nonsense until last year when my dad needed an urgent ambulance. All the dispatcher wanted for directions was the Eircode which mam hadn't bothered to learn. Thankfully a local youth group had made magnets with address and eircodes for all the residents in the village as part of a project and she had stuck it to her fridge and was able to just read it out to them. Should be somewhere easy to find/near the phone in any house in case of an emergency.


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    #135
    janfebmar
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,424 ✭✭✭janfebmar


    glack wrote: »
    Eircodes are invaluable in rural Ireland.

    It was high time some postal code system was used, but was spending the best part of 50,000,000 on eircode the right way to go? As someone else asked, it would be interesting to hear why Eircode is not used as a POSTCode for delivering mail by An POST even though it was designed by and for them in accordance with the POSTal Act. (“The National Postcode Systems is primarily for postal services”)
    Since it is not used as a POSTcode and only used as a Navigation Code, why did the Dept of Communications (via Ministers Pat Rabbitte & Alex White) waste ~€50M so far on Eircode when there were free Navigation Codes available in 2010 before they went to tender – NAC Codes, Map Codes, Google Plus Codes, Loc8 Codes etc etc – all of which could perform the Navigation task that Eircode is now used for better as they all apply to any locations across the whole island (North & South) & not just a postal addresses in the Republic?


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    #136
    Nobelium
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    glack wrote: »
    Eircodes are invaluable in rural Ireland. All couriers are using them - rarely get a phone call looking for directions, just phone calls checking we'll be there to sign for something.

    Extra valuable in emergencies. My mother thought they were nonsense until last year when my dad needed an urgent ambulance. All the dispatcher wanted for directions was the Eircode which mam hadn't bothered to learn. Thankfully a local youth group had made magnets with address and eircodes for all the residents in the village as part of a project and she had stuck it to her fridge and was able to just read it out to them. Should be somewhere easy to find/near the phone in any house in case of an emergency.

    no one's arguing the usefulness of post/delivery codes, other countries have been using them for generations at this stage.


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    #137
    glack
    Registered Users Posts: 695 ✭✭✭glack


    janfebmar wrote: »
    It was high time some postal code system was used, but was spending the best part of 50,000,000 on eircode the right way to go? As someone else asked, it would be interesting to hear why Eircode is not used as a POSTCode for delivering mail by An POST even though it was designed by and for them in accordance with the POSTal Act. (“The National Postcode Systems is primarily for postal services”)
    Since it is not used as a POSTcode and only used as a Navigation Code, why did the Dept of Communications (via Ministers Pat Rabbitte & Alex White) waste ~€50M so far on Eircode when there were free Navigation Codes available in 2010 before they went to tender – NAC Codes, Map Codes, Google Plus Codes, Loc8 Codes etc etc – all of which could perform the Navigation task that Eircode is now used for better as they all apply to any locations across the whole island (North & South) & not just a postal addresses in the Republic?
    I’d imagine it’s to do with the nature of Irish housing where many houses are not in close proximity to others or where identical addresses can be many miles apart in some cases. Only a system that pinpointed an exact address rather than a group of addresses would work. The random nature also future proofs it as it’s very simple to add new addresses as they don’t interfere with existing codes and aren’t out of sync either. At the end of the day, An Post is already going to every house in Ireland and have the advantage of many years of service and local knowledge where necessary so they don’t need it.


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    #138
    Duckworth_Luas
    Registered Users Posts: 5,733 ✭✭✭Duckworth_Luas


    From a data analyst and geo-analyst point of view Eircodes are the envy of the world community.

    They provide a direct 1:1 match between each individual in the country with their place of residence. This is invaluable for both government and business.

    Every five years the government carries out a census in order to better plan infrastructure and development projects.

    Let's say the Department of Education are reviewing the distribution of primary schools. They use Eircodes from the Census return forms to map all residences accurately. They then select from these mapped housing units those that have children under the age of 5. They can find those school catchment areas that in the coming years will have far more pupils than places and vice-versa. This allows them to plan the opening, closing and merging of schools as reliably and efficiently as possible. You can expand this to as many government departments as there are in existence.

    Now let's look at the private sector, say insurance companies. Consider a rural townland with eight residential addresses. As their addresses are the same the company has no other way to differentiate between them. However, this townland has four of the houses built in the northern end and four in the south, with the south also being a flood plain. The four southern residences have made repeated claims for flooding, but the insurance company only know that all eight have the same address and therefore the exact same location. So using only the vague postal address of the townland, all eight are considered susceptible to flooding and all have their premiums increased. With Eircodes the company can accurately map the actual house locations against actual flood plains. They will see that the four not making claims are outside its geographical boundary and these will not have their premiums increased.

    In similar fashion major studies in health, crime and retail benefit enormously from the introduction.

    Unlike the UK or US area based systems they do not lead to the phenomena of “postcode slums”. Eircode design gives no preconception about your status.

    Loc8Code is a red herring. Anyone can come up with the same algorithm, it's a common research project for geospatial science students. The people who designed Eircode would have done it themselves, in their sleep, but it's not suitable. The guy behind Loc8Code, like An Post, had a temper tantrum when he was turned down. Hence the anti-Eircode social media campaign, which included multiple sock-puppet posters on boards.


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    #139
    Sheep Shagger
    Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators Posts: 6,263 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sheep Shagger


    Don't forget that €50m plus later and the state doesn't even own the system- ownership rests with the UKs Capita - only in Ireland would there be a postal code that isn't compulsory to use and isn't owned by the government.

    The national broadband plan is going to repeat it- spend all the money and own nothing at the end of it. Anyone remember the M50 toll plazas where we had to buy it back after all those years - yes, there's a theme here...


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    #140
    janfebmar
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,424 ✭✭✭janfebmar


    Sheep Shagger wrote: »
    Don't forget that €50m plus later and the state doesn't even own the system- ownership rests with the UKs Capita - only in Ireland would there be a postal code that isn't compulsory to use and isn't owned by the government.

    The national broadband plan is going to repeat it- spend all the money and own nothing at the end of it. Anyone remember the M50 toll plazas where we had to buy it back after all those years - yes, there's a theme here...

    I wonder is the reason the courier company drivers (at least the last 2 who delivered to me anyway) never use it is because commercial users have to pay costly rates to use it?


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    #141
    Duckworth_Luas
    Registered Users Posts: 5,733 ✭✭✭Duckworth_Luas


    Sheep Shagger wrote: »
    Don't forget that €50m plus later and the state doesn't even own the system- ownership rests with the UKs Capita - only in Ireland would there be a postal code that isn't compulsory to use and isn't owned by the government.

    The national broadband plan is going to repeat it- spend all the money and own nothing at the end of it. Anyone remember the M50 toll plazas where we had to buy it back after all those years - yes, there's a theme here...
    Capita are the license holder, not the owner. They didn't even design the system. They system itself is based on GeoDirectory, which is state owned and where Capita have to make considerable payments to the state in order to use.


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    #142
    Duckworth_Luas
    Registered Users Posts: 5,733 ✭✭✭Duckworth_Luas


    janfebmar wrote: »
    I wonder is the reason the courier company drivers (at least the last 2 who delivered to me anyway) never use it is because commercial users have to pay costly rates to use it?
    They government want Eircodes to be financially self-sustaining. Hence they are closed source and require a payment to use.

    It the government gave it away freely imagine the outcry!

    The only courier companies who initially refused to use it were Euro wide operators who had a Euro wide database of addresses. The new Eircode would require an overhaul of their system to incorporate only a tiny percentage of their potential delivery points. The Freight Transport Authority of Ireland are such an example. Despite their name they only represent European wide distributors. They got a lot of media attention. Irish operators embraced it wholeheartedly, as you can see from all the reports on this thread.


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    #143
    Nobelium
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    Duckworth_Luas wrote: »
    They government want Eircodes to be financially self-sustaining. Hence they are closed source and require a payment to use.

    It the government gave it away freely imagine the outcry!

    Self sustaining ? it's a fecking grid reference, not an intergalactic space exploration programme.

    What outcry ? it would have just been another variation of the simple grid reference system used the world over for postcodes/deliveries, until the government, through their usual obsession with greed and control, decided to effectively encrypt it, then charge the householder via couriers and other service providers for the pleasure of being stuck with it.


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    #144
    Duckworth_Luas
    Registered Users Posts: 5,733 ✭✭✭Duckworth_Luas


    Nobelium wrote: »
    Self sustaining ? it's a fecking grid reference, not an intergalactic space exploration programme.

    What outcry ? it would have just been another variation of the simple grid reference system used the world over for postcodes/deliveries, until they through the usual obsession with greed and control, decided to effectively encrypt it, then charge the householder via couriers and other service providers for the pleasure of being stuck with it.
    How do you come up with a set of accurate coordinates for each and every business and residential addresses in the country?

    It takes years and must be continually updated and it costs a lot of government investment to do so.

    The project is called GeoDirectory, it's what the Eircode Address Database is based on. Like the ECAD you also need a license to use it.

    Anyway, it's obvious there's no point explaining how the real world works to people who want to blame "de gubbermint" for imaginary problems.


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    #145
    Nobelium
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    Duckworth_Luas wrote: »
    How do you come up with a set of accurate coordinates for each and every business and residential addresses in the country?

    the same as the rest of the word do, using a map grid reference system, that has already existed in Ireland for hundreds of years. An eircode is just and encrypted version of this, that we have to pay to have decrypted. Charlatanism at its Irish finest.

    Anyway, there's no point explaining how real world grid references work to people who thinks that is some sort of uniquely Irish 21st century voodoo rocket science.


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    #146
    astrofool
    Registered Users Posts: 16,496 ✭✭✭✭astrofool


    One of the big problems in Ireland previously was that there was no mapping and updating of addresses, meaning many residences weren't even known to exist, Eircode does this and doesn't continually cost the state money to keep it updated via fees charged to commercial organisations who want to use it.

    The amount spent on developing and publicising it is a drop in the ocean compared to the utility it provides, and it's seen one of the fastest uptakes of a postcode system within a country (given that it took decades for the UK to start using them). That and it's designed for a digital world, and isn't just hashing lat/longitude and then crying about it like the loc8 people.


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    #147
    Duckworth_Luas
    Registered Users Posts: 5,733 ✭✭✭Duckworth_Luas


    Nobelium wrote: »
    the same as any other country- the grid reference system has existed for hundreds of years
    No other country has , to my knowledge, a database of accurate coordinates of each residential and business address in the world.

    How do you think this is gathered? Apparently nobody knows their own Eircode, do you think anyone knows the WGS88 latitude, longitude and elevation of their address?

    This has to be mapped, collated and constructed into a relational database at considerable expense to Ordnance Survey Ireland and An Post and hence the government. It also has to be updated at regular intervals, every 3 months at present, to ensure currency.

    It's clear you have no idea how this works.


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    #148
    Duckworth_Luas
    Registered Users Posts: 5,733 ✭✭✭Duckworth_Luas


    Nobelium wrote: »
    Anyway, there's no point explaining how real world grid references work to people who thinks that is some sort of uniquely Irish 21st century voodoo rocket science.
    LOL! I've worked in the area for 20 years!


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    #149
    Nobelium
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    Duckworth_Luas wrote: »
    No other country has , to my knowledge, a database of accurate coordinates of each residential and business address in the world.

    How do you think this is gathered? Apparently nobody knows their own Eircode, do you think anyone knows the WGS88 latitude, longitude and elevation of their address?

    you point, or click at the fecking map and read a simple alpha numeric grid reference for any location, same as people have been doing the world over for years, but now we're forced to use an encrypted grid reference, and this is supposed to be some marvelous innovation ? lol


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    #150
    BonnieSituation
    Registered Users Posts: 18,923 ✭✭✭✭BonnieSituation


    Nobelium wrote: »
    you point, or click at the fecking map and read the alpha numeric grid reference for any location, as people have been doing for years, but now were forced to use an encrypted grid reference, and this is supposed to be some marvelous innovation. lol

    How do you think that the eircode "knows" where it should be when you search for it on Google maps?

    It's almost like there's a relational database in the background that Google licence, that matches each eircode to an ITM/WGS84 coordinate! Or it's magic.


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    #151
    gctest50
    Registered Users Posts: 9,605 ✭✭✭gctest50


    Nobelium wrote: »
    you point, or click at the fecking map and read a simple alpha numeric grid reference for any location, same as people have been doing the world over for years, but now were forced to use an encrypted grid reference.............

    OK, what system would YOU pick if it was up to you ?


    raw "gps" like 52.xxxxxxxxx, 8.yyyyyyyyyyyy stuff excluded


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