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Eircode - its implemetation (merged)

beveragelady

I called An Post today to try to sort out a problem with deliveries. The customer service chap was very helpful and I think it all got sorted.
The thing is, I tried to give him my Eircode because I live at a vague rural address but he said that they're not using them because the system isn't set up.
Amazed!
It's bad enough that they're no good to users of satnavs or google maps, but this is just astonishing. Can anybody explain how this could have been launched to such fanfare when it's all but meaningless?

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ukoda

plodder wrote: »

Of course they are different, but what do they have in common that Eircode doesn't have? They are hierarchical down to relatively small areas, and each code refers to an area rather than an individual property.

To be fair. Most postcodes just represent a large area, similar to eircode routing keys and don't go down to a small area

plodder

ukoda wrote: »

To be fair. Most postcodes just represent a large area, similar to eircode routing keys and don't go down to a small area

It varies based on the size of the country. At a guess, I would say that most countries postcodes have at least three levels of hierarchy, two more than Eircode.

Each level of hierarchy allows possibility for sorting etc without having to pay anyone for database lookups.

oscarBravo

Why are we so hung up on the idea that postcodes should allow private companies to gain commercial advantage at no cost to them but instead at the taxpayers' expense?

Sam Russell

oscarBravo wrote: »

Why are we so hung up on the idea that postcodes should allow private companies to gain commercial advantage at no cost to them but instead at the taxpayers' expense?

Is that not the same as upgrading the national road to motorway to allow freight to be delivered cheaper and quicker at no extra cost (except for the dozen or so tolls)?

Those upgrades benefit the haulage companies at the states expense. Haulage companies have benefited from the huge reduction in road tax in the last budget.

Haulage companies are private companies, aren't they?

Sam Russell

I was going to start a new thread but thought the 'An Post not using Eircode' was doing the job.

Thanks for saving me the job.

clewbays

plodder wrote: »

Each level of hierarchy allows possibility for sorting etc without having to pay anyone for database lookups.

What did database lookups mean in the 1950s when other countries introduced their systems? Computers, ATMs, rockets, mobile phones, satellites - how many systems designed in the 1950s are ignoring all of these advances in technology and persisting in using human labour instead.

oscarBravo

Sam Russell wrote: »

Is that not the same as upgrading the national road to motorway to allow freight to be delivered cheaper and quicker at no extra cost (except for the dozen or so tolls)?

Yes. If you ignore tolls, it's the same thing. But if you don't ignore tolls...?

Sam Russell

oscarBravo wrote: »

Yes. If you ignore tolls, it's the same thing. But if you don't ignore tolls...?

There are only a dozen tolls - many more motorways, and lorries routinely avoid the tolls, but benefit from the rest of the motorway system, not to mention the other upgraded roads.

The post code is a piece of infrastructure that should be free to use just like the phone book.

gctest50

Sam Russell wrote: »

.......

The post code is a piece of infrastructure that should be free to use just like the phone book.

You have 49 searches left today.

You get 50 free lookups a day, what more do you want ?

Business ? get off the training wheels and act like one

L1011

New passport forms ask for it, but it wasn't printed on the envelope sent out.

marmurr1916

ukoda wrote: »

I thought we were getting a thread for this when the National Postcodes thread was closed, but apparently not. So I've started one.

Where have you seen eircode being used?

Today I noticed the An Post address checker has been updated to include eircode

http://correctaddress.anpost.ie/pages/Search.aspx

If you type in T12 A into the 'Enter Eircode' box and hit return, you will get a list of all the addresses that contain the characters T12 A***, a total of 49 separate addresses.

Combined with the 50 per day searches that you can do on the eircode finder website (a limit which can be over-ridden by a free Chrome extension - search the National Postcodes To Be Introduced thread or Google 'free chrome extension eircode finder'), it might be handy for people who want to build address/eircode databases on the cheap.

If you get 735 results (15 x 49) from the An Post website per day, plus 50 from the Eircode Finder website, you'd have 7,850 correct postal addresses, complete with Eircodes, after 10 days.

Not bad for a small local business that might want to confine direct mail marketing to (part of) one Eircode routing code area.

Over a year you could build up, for free, an accurate database of An Post preferred format postal addresses, complete with Eircodes, and end up with 286,525 entries, or many more if you used the free Chrome extension referred to above.

marmurr1916

gctest50 wrote: »

You get 50 free lookups a day, what more do you want ?

Business ? get off the training wheels and act like one

Royal Mail permits 50 free searches of its address/postcode database per day. I'm not sure why Eircode should be more generous.

If you go to the An Post website, you get 15 free searches per day, but if you type in T12 A into the 'Enter Eircode' box and hit return, you will get a list ofaddresses that contain the characters T12 A***, a total of 49 separate addresses is displayed.

Do that for different Eircodes (e.g. type in T12 F and you'll get 49 x T12 F*** results) and you'll get many more than 15 results per day.

So you can get 50 results per day from the Eircode Finder website, and a multiple of 15 results (up to 735) per day from the An Post website for free.

And if you know about the free Chrome extension for the Eircode Finder website, you can over-ride the 50 searches per day limit and get unlimited free searches on that website.

Simply type the words 'free chrome extension eircode finder' into Google and you're sorted!

Edit:

I've now tried the partial Eircode method with three different partial Eircodes (T12 A, T12 F and D03 N) on the An Post website.

In each case I've got 49 separate address (i.e. 49 x T12 A***, 49 x T12 F*** and 49 x D03 N***) results.

I'm not sure if this means there are only 49 addresses with those characters, or if An Post restricts the total number of addresses you can view each time by using this method to 49 addresses per search.

If the latter, then you can get a maximum of 735 results per day from the An Post website, combined with 50 per day from the Eircode Finder website.

That's a maximum total of 785 free results per day, or 286,525 free results per year without using the Chrome extension.

Would most SMEs in Ireland need more than 286,525 free results per year?

marmurr1916

Interesting.

I've now tried that method with three different partial Eircodes (T12 A, T12 F and D03 N).

In each case I've got 49 separate address (i.e. 49 x T12 A***, 49 x T12 F*** and 49 x D03 N***) results.

I'm not sure if this means there are only 49 addresses with those characters, or if An Post restricts the total number of addresses you can view each time by using this method to 49 addresses per search.

If the latter, then you can get a maximum of 735 results per day from the An Post website (http://correctaddress.anpost.ie/pages/Search.aspx), combined with 50 per day from the Eircode Finder website.

That's a maximum total of 785 free results per day, or 286,525 free results per year without using the Chrome extension.

Would most SMEs in Ireland need more than 286,525 free results per year?

my3cents

Did you try clearing your cache and or rebooting the router?

marmurr1916

Dave_Dublin wrote: »

I'm having a problem with deliveries since the Eircodes were introduced.

I added the Eircode to my address instead of "Dublin 7" since the code starts "D07" and I've been waited nearly 4 weeks for something that should've been here in 4 days!

The order was in 4 identical boxes with the same exact address on each in the same position on each box.

Box #1 arrived in 4 days; box #2 arrived the following day but box #3 took THREE WEEKS to arrive and when it did, it had
"IMPORTANT : Delay caused by incorrect postal address" labels all over it -- one would've sufficed.

The final box has still not arrived.

I contacted An Post via their website on Wednesday last but I have not yet received a response.

My address is in the format :

XXX Road Name
Dublin
D07 XXXX

--- Previously it would've been always :

XXX Road Name
Dublin 7

The correct address you should be using as per An Post is:

XXX Road Name
Dublin 7
D07 XXXX

Your post-town is not Dublin, it's Dublin 7. Keep using the 7 after Dublin, and then add the Eircode underneath.

jmkennedyie

One-off donation form on http://www.msf.ie/donate may have an optional field that asks for an eircode...but to find out for sure: you know what you have to do

...Merry xmas

Alun

I got a couple of deliveries yesterday via Parcel Motel that have the eircode of the "motel" on the address label.

ukoda

Alun wrote: »

I got a couple of deliveries yesterday via Parcel Motel that have the eircode of the "motel" on the address label.

Yes I see that, they have put them on all the motel locations

http://www.parcelmotel.com/locations/

marmurr1916

my3cents wrote: »

Did you try clearing your cache and or rebooting the router?

No need. Use Chrome, add the free extension (available by googling free chrome extension eircode finder) and you can get unlimited daily searches.

Agent_47

What is Eircode? Seems like another waste of money quango.

oscarBravo

Agent_47 wrote: »

What is Eircode?

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=eircode

gizmo555

Six months on, in summary:

A tiny proportion (guesstimated at 2%) of letters sent via An Post include an Eircode in the address;
The Freight Transport Association of Ireland says none of its members use Eircodes;
The Irish Road Haulage Association says Eircode is "worthless" for its members' purposes;
The Irish Fire and Emergency Services Association says its members cannot use Eircodes to locate addresses;
Retail Ireland says Eircodes can "reduce costs" but the Comptroller and Auditor General says the initially projected cost of €18m has more than doubled to €38m and "It is not clear that benefits-to-the-value-projected will be achieved".

A resounding success so . . .

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/consumer/six-months-on-people-still-confounded-by-eircode-system-1.2476492

View

GJG wrote: »

I think you are correct that the haphazard nature of addressing is unfortunate. You say that introducing Eircode before what you regard as a 'proper addressing system' is the 'main problem'. Other than 'Don't start from here', what exactly is your suggested solution?

Make the local authorities responsible for their local addressing and make use of all official addresses, after the inevitable two or three round review periods (to allow for corrections etc), mandatory by all regulated bodies within the State.

Eircode uses An Post's Geodirectory and if you look it up, they state that your "postal address" may use the wrong COUNTY if it suits them, never mind the wrong area. An Post aren't our legislature and the issue of them overriding the democratic decisions of the Oireachtas on what our counties, areas etc are should never have been allowed to arise in the first place.

And, correcting our addresses, could easily have been done either before or in parallel to the introduction of Eircode given that the latter took a decade+ to introduce. After all, An Post's argument against Eircode was their internal OCR sorting was good enough so they didn't need it, so the reform of the postal addresses did not need to wait for Eircode. It could have been done even if we had never decided to introduce Eircode.

GJG

View wrote: »

Make the local authorities responsible for their local addressing and make use of all official addresses, after the inevitable two or three round review periods (to allow for corrections etc), mandatory by all regulated bodies within the State.

I've no particular objection to this, though I think that you are underestimating the likely level of local resistance - "two or three round review periods" - and you haven't given any clear reason behind the proposal. Maybe there is one, but I can't see what it is, so could you be clearer on what the return on investment would be?

View wrote: »

And, correcting our addresses, could easily have been done either before or in parallel to the introduction of Eircode given that the latter took a decade+ to introduce. After all, An Post's argument against Eircode was their internal OCR sorting was good enough so they didn't need it, so the reform of the postal addresses did not need to wait for Eircode. It could have been done even if we had never decided to introduce Eircode.

Sure, it could have been done, as you say, before or in parallel to the introduction of Eircode. Or it could be done now, after the introduction of Eircode - there's nothing about Eircode that inhibits anything you are suggesting. The one thing that inhibits your suggestion is its cost and difficulty, set against the absence of any stated benefit. I fail to see how Eircode would increase the cost or difficulty, and since you haven't mentioned any benefit at all, I don't see how Eircode could impact that. Maybe you could detail both.

It is notable that, although this has been pushed since the introduction of Eircode, there was no interest in such a project before that. It seems to me that the reason for coming up with a project likely to be held up by a million local objections, and insisting for no apparent reason that Eircode should not proceed without it, is to generate an excuse to delay or cancel Eircode.

SPDUB

gizmo555 wrote: »

Six months on, in summary:

A tiny proportion (guesstimated at 2%) of letters sent via An Post include an Eircode in the address;

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/consumer/six-months-on-people-still-confounded-by-eircode-system-1.2476492

Most letters put into the mail system are not handled by counter staff ,even the ones where people purchase stamps at the PO , so that claim of 2% is pretty bad journalism by The Irish Times

[Deleted User]

Who needs postcodes!

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-gloucestershire-35174646
A German Christmas card with just "England" on the envelope has reached the right address in Gloucestershire.
Paul Biggs, from Longlevens, said he was absolutely shocked when his postman arrived at his front door with the card from his friends in Bitburg in Germany.
He said: "I can't believe it - it's eerie - it's just got 'England' and sent from a sorting office in Bitburg."
Royal Mail said its "address detectives" were renowned but "even by their standards" it was impressive.
Mr Biggs said the card had been sent by his friends in Germany on Monday and was handed to him by his postman on Wednesday morning.
The postman had been carrying the letter as he completed his round, asking his customers if the card was for them.

gizmo555

SPDUB wrote: »

Most letters put into the mail system are not handled by counter staff ,even the ones where people purchase stamps at the PO , so that claim of 2% is pretty bad journalism by The Irish Times

It wasn't a claim by the Irish Times of 2%, it was an accurate report of the estimate by one member of counter staff. Anecdotal, to be sure, but certainly indicative.

Anyway, it's beside the point, in the sense that using Eircode won't get your post to its destination faster, nor will it delay it if you don't. It's redundant, so far as An Post is concerned.

SPDUB

gizmo555 wrote: »

It wasn't a claim by the Irish Times of 2%, it was an accurate report of the estimate by one member of counter staff. Anecdotal, to be sure, but certainly indicative.

The only thing it's indicative of is bad journalism by the Irish Times where someone forgot the journalism ethos to question everything because with the smallest bit of thought you would realise that the post the counter staff sees is a small amount of items where someone purchases a stamp in that PO let alone most items posted on that day .

So no that claim of 2% is in no way indicative when it's only a small sunset of a small subset

anothernight

To be fair, there's probably not much difference between the letters that are handed in at the counter and those that are posted directly. It's a very small subsection, yes, but why would those letters be different than the others? Is a particular section of Irish society more likely to take their letters to the counter at the post office? Older people maybe? Office workers? The unemployed? People under 25?
Unless there's a marked difference between senders who use the post office counter and senders who don't, I think it's reasonable to assume that letters sent through the post office are representative of other letters.

The claim is clearly anecdotal anyway and should be taken as such, but I don't see why it should be dismissed as bad journalism.

EDIT: On second thought, I suppose people are less likely to use Eircode where it's too much hassle for them to look it up (again, bad implementation), and the post office is probably one of those places. If people are addressing their letters right at the post office, I suppose it might be less likely that they use Eircode. Do many people do that?

Sam Russell

anothernight wrote: »

EDIT: On second thought, I suppose people are less likely to use Eircode where it's too much hassle for them to look it up (again, bad implementation), and the post office is probably one of those places. If people are addressing their letters right at the post office, I suppose it might be less likely that they use Eircode. Do many people do that?

For non-unique addresses, I do not believe it is possible to look up the Eircode, as the property must be identified on an Ordnance Survey map, and if you do not know the area (all you have is the person's names and address) then that is impossible. It is bad design as well as bad implementation. Unique addresses should have been sorted, or at least an implementation plan to do so.