The same principle applies across many sectors – from education, banking, finance and insurance to legal services, healthcare, logistics, retail, charities and membership organisations.
Every address you capture is more than a contact detail. Used well, it becomes a key to additional insight. Linked to the right datasets, it can reveal geographic, demographic, property, business and risk information that supports better decisions and more efficient processes. Yet many organisations still overlook this potential or rely on time-consuming manual lookups. Once you understand what is possible, neither approach makes sense.
Place intelligence reveals more about the location itself, including coordinates, urban–rural classification, property type and administrative boundaries. AFD’s data supports accurate addressing, planning, routing and service delivery.
Property intelligence dives into details about the property or premises, including attributes, household context and indicators that support valuation, risk assessment and decision-making.
People and organisational intelligence reveals more about the organisations or individuals connected to an address. Using business, Companies House and demographic data, it can support targeting, profiling and cleaner records.
A short conversation could uncover opportunities you may not yet have considered or show how organisations like yours are already using additional data to improve processes, reduce costs, increase margins, and retain and grow customers. If you can’t see the dataset you want – ask us, and we’ll see what we can do!
Speak directly with Joel Miller on 0333 433 0711 or email joel.miller@afd.co.uk for a personal, tailored introduction.
With Gold Status in the Teaching Excellence Framework, recognition as Best Music Production School by DJ Mag, and the title of Best Independent HE Provider at the 2023 IHE Awards, Point Blank Music School is operating at the top of its game.
Now, with new power to award degrees, the school is determined to ensure the widest range of students can access its world-class training.
That commitment depends on accurate, reliable data. Specialist datasets such as POLAR (Participation of Local Areas) and IMD (Index of Multiple Deprivation) help institutions understand patterns of higher education participation and deprivation. When linked directly to student addresses, this data supports funding, regulatory reporting and widening participation.
Gabby McLaren, Head of Data and Insight at Point Blank, explains:
“Institutions need to track how effectively they attract students from disadvantaged backgrounds and underrepresented areas.
Previously, we had to take each student postcode, find the relevant POLAR and IMD data using various online lookup tools, then manually copy and paste each item into the student record. The process was slow, resource-heavy and prone to error. As a result, reporting could be inaccurate, interventions were often delayed, contextual offers were not always applied correctly, and there was a real risk to funding.
We first contacted AFD Software three years ago to discuss our requirements for validating student addresses at the point of entry and reporting on POLAR and IMD data. When we realised this additional data could be returned automatically, removing the need for manual, error-prone work, implementing AFD’s solution was an easy decision.
Our partnership with AFD was strengthened further last year when TUNDRA (Tracking Underrepresentation by Area) data was added by the Office for Students to our reporting requirements. AFD added this dataset at our request, saving us from returning to manual lookups.
The impact of adding these datasets has been significant. Before AFD added TUNDRA to its solution, we carried out an internal review of the October 2025 cohort for regulatory reporting and found that around 30% of records required correction. That figure is now just 1.67%. We also save two full weeks of staff time each year, and our data remains continuously up to date.
Instead of chasing data, the team can now trust it – supporting better decision-making, stronger reporting and more timely student support.”
When Poor Data Breaks the Connection
There was a second issue – and this one had a direct impact on revenue.
Online enquiry forms were intended to speed up engagement, but free-text entry meant that mistakes in email addresses and phone numbers could easily slip through.
Gabby explains: “We were losing around 20% of leads simply because we could not contact the enquirer. For international students, the impact was particularly clear – an estimated 10 lost students, representing around £400,000 in student lifetime value. We identified this through ongoing analysis of our enquiry and conversion data. The fix was again straightforward: real-time validation for phone and email fields.”
“With accurate email and phone data captured at source, those lost connections – and lost revenue – can now be prevented rather than recovered. With AFD, we capture addresses, enrich them, and validate other contact details automatically, reliably and confidently.”
Gabby McLaren,
Head of Data and Insight at Point Blank Music School
Expert Insight
Point Blank’s experience shows the value of treating routine data as a source of intelligence, not just administration. By linking additional datasets and validating contact details at the point of capture, the school reduced manual work, improved accuracy, strengthened reporting and protected valuable opportunities.
The wider lesson is clear: when contact data can be trusted from the start, teams spend less time correcting problems and more time acting on the insight already held within their data.
The next step is to make that standard practice, not the exception.
To explore how your organisation could improve its own data quality processes, speak to one of our experienced data quality experts today on 0333 433 0711 or email joel.miller@afd.co.uk.
Last December, Aifric O’Shea, AFD Web Designer & IT Technician, and four other AFD Postcode People, travelled to one of earth’s most inaccessible regions to see our partnership with Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) in action. This mission – supported by an aircraft donated by AFD, named, appropriately, P2-AFD, witnessed first-hand how vital links are maintained where the environment is most unforgiving. This is Aifric’s story:
Lessons from the Edge of the World
“As our small aircraft flew over the Papua New Guinea highlands, the village of Yomneki appeared – a tiny defiance against the wilderness. Touching down on a narrow grass strip carved into the mountainside, the isolation was immediate. There are no roads leading here, only jagged, jungle-clad peaks in every direction.
Stepping off the plane, we weren’t met by silence, but by a large, expectant crowd. Some lived right on the edge of the airstrip; others had walked for hours through the mountains just to meet us. As P2- AFD took off and disappeared away over the ridge, reality set in – we were entirely cut off, and our stay was now at the mercy of the elements.
From the Ground Up
Yomneki follows a rhythm dictated by the sun and the community. It was striking to see villagers carrying mobile phones, yet without network or internet, they only provide basic functions. Back home, we are ‘always on’ but often distracted; here, attention is fully on the people around you.
The villagers were eager to share their stories, seeing us as a rare bridge to the outside world. Their hospitality was humbling. While their diet consists primarily of what they grow – fruit and vegetables shared generously with us – meat is a rare luxury.
Their struggles were most evident in their local economy. Coffee grows well here, but without a reliable route to market, crops often spoil. While MAF aircraft are a lifeline, their priority is rightfully medical evacuations and essential supplies. As a result, villagers’ hard work doesn’t always translate to income and community development.
The airstrip itself is a monument to their determination. Built entirely by hand over 18 years, it stands as a testament to the persistence required to create a single doorway to the world.
When Flying isn’t an Option
But building the strip is only part of the challenge. Back at the MAF base we had met the team that keeps these planes in the air through a massive logistical effort: training, maintenance, fuelling, and complex scheduling. Yet even with all this in place, the environment often has the final word.
We saw first-hand how poor conditions can quickly make landing impossible. Our own landing was a bumpy reminder of this fragility as we unexpectedly skid through the mud. With no guarantee of a return flight, the reality was stark: the only option would be days of walking through treacherous terrain.
Invisible Connections
Back home on the Isle of Man, we’re no strangers to disruption – ferries can be cancelled and flights grounded – yet we’re rarely truly isolated. Our networks continue quietly in the background, largely unnoticed because they simply work. In Yomneki, there is one known, trusted point of arrival. If that path becomes uncertain, everything stops.
That contrast has stayed with us. Connection depends not on constant visibility, but on reliability – on knowing exactly where something can arrive and trusting the route will hold. When certainty disappears, the consequences are felt immediately.
Yomneki’s challenges were extreme, but the lesson is universal. Dependable connections don’t happen by chance. They’re built, maintained, and trusted over time. Ensuring they are reliable is work worth doing. ”
Most organisations assume their rapid address entry solution is “good enough”. In reality, cheaper solutions often miss millions of valid addresses without anyone realising it. Particularly flats, new builds, rural properties, and specialist address types. Others are simply wrong.
These blind spots are common in address validation services built on crowd-sourced, scraped, or incomplete datasets. The failure is rarely immediately obvious. When customers can’t find their address, they improvise, or choose the nearest match, which isn’t correct. Data degrades quietly. Costs surface elsewhere.
Address data rarely fails loudly. It fails expensively – and invisibly. In this article, gain expert insight into why the source and completeness of address data matter, where hidden costs arise, and why authoritative address validation is foundational infrastructure rather than a technical nice-to-have.
The Hidden Costs Lurking in Everyday Operations
Poor-quality address data introduces risk at the earliest possible point: data capture. Once errors enter a system, they propagate.
Common consequences include:
Each issue carries a direct operational cost. Together, they affect customer experience, reputation, compliance, and retention – often without being traced back to the original address validation choice.
Organisations that trial cheaper alternatives frequently discover the impact only after problems escalate. Many then turn to specialist providers like AFD to repair address data and prevent recurrence – to have their cheer restored!
Why the Source of Address Data Matters
Address validation is only as reliable as the reference data behind it.
AFD Software licenses, maintains, and validates address data exclusively from authoritative sources. For Great Britain and Northern Ireland, AFD use Royal Mail and Ordnance Survey data. These two definitive sources together provide around 32 million uniquely referenced addresses.
International address data is sourced only from verifiable, tested providers, never scraped or crowd-sourced.
Crucially, this data is actively maintained. Royal Mail’s postal workforce feeds back address changes encountered on delivery routes, supported by customer feedback and failed-delivery reports from major retailers. New addresses are added, errors corrected, and obsolete records removed. Authoritative data is not static. It evolves daily.
Many non-specialist services rely on partial datasets. When an address does not exist in the dataset, validation cannot occur. Users are forced into free-text entry, increasing errors and creating exactly the downstream costs professional address validation is designed to prevent.
AFD provides access to approximately 900,000 additional valid UK address records beyond the standard Royal Mail Postcode Address File (PAF), including flats, unit numbers, and recently built properties that are otherwise unavailable.
If an address cannot be found, it cannot be validated – no matter how polished the interface appears.
Structure, Precision, and Long-Term Usability
Trustworthy address data depends on consistent structure. AFD solutions return addresses in a standardised, predictable format, enabling:
Without recognised UK and international postal standards, passing address data between systems and linking it to external sources such as credit reference agencies becomes difficult or impossible.
Validation Alone Is Not Enough
Many organisations already hold years of flawed address data. AFD cleans it.
AFD’s cleansing engine corrects errors in legacy and incoming datasets, producing the cleanest possible address record while ensuring all new entries conform to the same structure. This reduces ambiguity, prevents false positives, and lowers the long-term cost of maintaining data quality. Address Validation prevents new problems; cleansing fixes existing ones. Both are essential.
Why Mapping-Led Alternatives Fall Short
Many online services are designed primarily to place points on a map. They may look effective, but they do not provide definitive postal addresses.
Without complete, authoritative datasets, they often:
For example, a UK address such as Orchard House, HD3 3LL, is found immediately by AFD’s solution, even when entered imperfectly. Many non-PAF options do not recognise it at all.
The question is not whether an address looks right, but whether it can be trusted operationally.
 | Education | Lost enrolments, funding risks |
| Banking & Finance | Failed payments, compliance exposure |
| Charities | Lost donations, failed Gift Aid claims |
| Logistics | Missed deliveries, wasted fuel |
| Health | Missed appointments, safeguarding risks |
| Legal & Insurance | Invalid cover, disputes |
In some cases, the impact extends far beyond a single transaction.
Judge for Yourself. Warners Did.
Warners Group Publications plc recently compared AFD with a lower-cost, non-PAF alternative. The alternative could locate organisations and points of interest, but residential address data was often incomplete or outdated. As customer onboarding, call centre operations, and downstream processing all depend on accurate address data, Warners chose to stay with AFD.
They also cited knowledgeable, fast responses from the AFD Postcode People’s UK-based support, predictable pricing, and long-term product stability as decisive factors. The alternative had changing service models and lacked fast access to deep expertise. AFD provided clarity, continuity, and control.
Mint Velvet use AFD Shopify Plugin. Why?
Around 200,000 UK stores use the Shopify platform, but did you know that the default Shopify address lookup doesn’t use definitive Royal Mail or Ordnance Survey address data? The result is significant address data gaps and inaccuracies. Flats, new builds, rural properties, and specialist address types cannot be validated with certainty. The consequences are rarely visible at checkout. They become all too obvious later as deliveries fail, returns increase and correction costs rise.
That’s why AFD created the Shopify Plugin. Our goal is to ensure that you can avoid simple costly service errors that prevent or delay delivery – and damage reputation and revenue. Built on Royal Mail and Ordnance Survey data – the user types a postcode and selects the address or just starts to type their address and AFD quickly narrows to a single valid, deliverable address.
Relaxed glamour brand Mint Velvet is one of the largest Shopify platform users, with millions of online shoppers. After implementing the AFD Shopify Plugin to their checkout, Technical Development Lead Jon Ashcroft testified: “The implementation of the AFD Shopify Plugin has made a significant improvement to our whole checkout process, with better accuracy and reliability for both the customer journey and Mint Velvet’s operations.”
Consistent address data accuracy flows downstream through your organisation and its systems. It reduces failures, rework, and customer service queries in the UK and internationally. Cutting overheads – increasing margins.
AFD Software has specialised exclusively in address, location, and contact data for over 40 years. Our solutions return a single, unambiguous address – or a short, clear pick list when clarification is required. This happens even when the input is incomplete or inaccurate. Our cleansing tools deliver consistently high-quality results.
Accurate address data is not an optional extra. It is infrastructure. When the underlying data is incomplete or unreliable, the costs surface everywhere else – persistently, expensively and reputationally.
Need clean legacy address data & lower downstream costs?
For precision address data accuracy, speak to one of our experts today on 0333 433 0711 or emailing postcode@afd.co.uk.
At AFD, our work with Royal Mail and the Postcode Address File (PAF®) has always extended far beyond the role of a typical data distributor.
For many years, we’ve been directly involved in the checking, processing and distribution of the PAF® files used by more than 40,000 organisations across the UK. Millions of daily transactions rely on these datasets for accurate deliveries, identity verification, fraud prevention, customer experience, and operational logistics.
This close, trusted partnership with Royal Mail’s Address Management Unit is central to the reliability and compliance standards we uphold. It’s also one of the key reasons our address validation services are recognised for their stability, integrity and accuracy.
Thousands of organisations including Royal Mail, DPD, WWF-UK, Lloyds, University of Oxford, AO.com and Compare the Market partner with us and rely on AFD’s solutions for address lookup and postcode validation.
If your systems previously depended on GetAddress.io, we’re ready to help you transition smoothly and securely. Our team can support a rapid migration with minimal disruption, ensuring your address‑lookup capabilities remain reliable and compliant.
For immediate assistance, you can contact us on 0333 433 0711 or email postcode@afd.co.uk.
We’re here to make sure your operations don’t miss a beat.
From the desk of Leon Henery, CTO, AFD Software
When outages strike, continuity counts
October’s cloud failures were a masterclass in fragility. A major Amazon Web Services (AWS) region collapsed from a Domain Name System (DNS – the system that translates website names into the actual servers they run on) defect. Azure’s Content Delivery Network (CDN – a system that helps deliver online content quickly) misconfiguration followed nine days later. Between them, they knocked thousands of organisations offline.
The UK escaped relatively unscathed, but that’s cold comfort. The technical failures that crippled Virginia could just as easily strike London tomorrow. At AFD Software, we’ve never designed our architecture around hope.
Beyond the Myth of the Infallible Cloud
The AWS outage on 20th October started with a latent defect in US-EAST-1’s DNS infrastructure. With no way to translate a website URL to the IP address, within minutes, applications couldn’t resolve service endpoints, triggering cascading failures. Major brands lost access to critical systems for hours.
We’ve never accepted the assumption that cloud giants are infallible. Our approach has been consistent: every system can fail, so design for resilience. That principle drives the architecture behind our Evolution Platform, the engine that powers all our services.
Built for Continuity
For more than a decade, AFD has operated two independent, production-grade environments: one in AWS, providing a high performance cloud platform across multiple availability zones; the other in our own Tier 3-equivalent data centre at our Isle of Man head office, with independent power, connectivity, and physical security.
These aren’t just backups, both are live, always ready to take 100% of customer load. This active-active design means zero-downtime maintenance, real geographic diversity, and no single point of failure. On a product level, calls that fail in AWS are automatically routed to our own data centre, and if problems persist, all traffic can be redirected in under 60 seconds.
Unique: Extended Resilience
We extend this resilience to our customers. Beyond our hosted solution, AFD offers on-premises deployment giving organisations complete control. Windows installers or Docker images are available to be installed on your site and can operate standalone or as part of a hybrid architecture. This hybrid approach provides control where you need it, with the option to
failover to AFD’s hosted infrastructure when your systems face unexpected disruption. Whether fully hosted, on-prem, or hybrid, AFD ensures your services remain available.
Measured in Minutes, Proven in Years
Numbers tell the story best. Over the past four years, AFD has maintained uptime exceeding 99.99% across our hosted platforms, surpassing even our own internal targets. In practice, that represents only seconds of potential downtime each year, with no full-service interruptions across our combined Tier 3 Data Centre at our Mountain View HQ and AWS environments.
That level of reliability doesn’t happen by accident. It’s the result of continuous investment and a culture that treats uptime not as a statistic, but as a promise.
Team and Technology
At the heart of every resilient system is a resilient team. Our DevOps team continually refines our infrastructure for security, speed, and efficiency. They ensure that AWS Shield defends against Distributed Denial of Service attacks, our Web Application Firewall filters malicious traffic, and our load balancers direct requests intelligently to healthy nodes.
If any single environment is compromised, we are ready. In the extreme event that both environments were simultaneously compromised it takes just 45 minutes to create and deploy a completely new healthy production environment. That is one benefit of our truly agnostic, fully automated architecture. But our greatest strength isn’t automation, it’s our attitude. We don’t accept outages. We engineer around them.
Eyes on the Horizon
Cloud computing remains indispensable; its scale and elasticity make it hard to ignore. But October’s failures proved that even giants aren’t infallible.
The question isn’t whether to use the cloud, but whether you can rely on it alone. At AFD, we give customers architectural choice without compromise: deploy our products in your data centre, use our dual-region hosted environment, or build a hybrid solution that fails over seamlessly between your systems and ours.
Every address lookup, every payment, every moment of trust matters. We care about your business, your growth, your success. That’s why at AFD, reliability isn’t just claimed – it’s built.
To discuss how AFD Software can help strengthen your organisation’s resilience strategy,
contact our team on 0333 433 0711 or email postcode@afd.co.uk.
AFD Software Ltd, “The Postcode People”, held their annual Postcode Party and Charity Giveaway at Mountain View Innovation Centre on Thursday 27th November 2025.
The Postcode People are the world’s leading experts in British Postal Data – driving efficiency in data records, logistics and political information flows. All Postcode Data used in the UK, Isle of Man and the Channel Islands is first processed at Mountain View before distribution back to Royal Mail and its many customers.
Now in its 43rd year of business, AFD welcomed representatives of many of the 80 Charities supported this year – and who are receiving a share of £1.8 million – to celebrate the way that funds can make a massive difference in the Isle of Man, the UK and the Wider World. These organisations were chosen by AFD’s 40+ workforce with many of the nominations based on very personal stories of help and support.
AFD’s 2025 donations enable international development and education projects, support for mental wellbeing, health charities and end-of-life care, protection of the environment, and continuing investments in organisations fighting modern slavery and child exploitation.
Group Director, Alison Dorricott, closed the evening: “What a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving. Whilst what we do in our daily work makes such a difference to business and public sector efficiency every day – tonight we can celebrate a much wider impact – in the Isle of Man, the UK and across the world”.
Care for the Family is a national charity dedicated to strengthening family life through initiatives such as activity breaks for single parents, bereavement support events, and friendship programs for parents of children with additional needs.
AFD’s donation will help expand their prison programme, supporting prisoners to reflect on family relationships, strengthen bonds, and reduce reoffending, while also funding an additional family building break for single parents in Summer 2026.
“A strong Family is the fundamental building block of a flourishing society – we love the many ways in which Care for the Family have supported and strengthened families in so many rich and varied ways over many years.”
David & Alison Dorricott, Directors
Rebecca House is a purpose-built facility offering respite, palliative, and end-of-life care for children with life-limiting or life-threatening conditions from birth to 18 years. This year, they established a new panel with Manx Care, resulting in their highest-ever number of referrals and bringing the total number of children in their care to 52.
AFD’s donation will be used to give the children special outings to places such as the Wildlife Park and other recreational activities that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford to do.
“I chose this charity because they give local children with life-limiting conditions the care and support they need, helping families through the most difficult times.”
Ben Richards – Properties Team
Working in Pakistan, Starfish Asia’s mission is to help disadvantaged Christian children escape poverty through education. They do this by creating learning environments that inspire ambition, raise aspirations, and achieve lasting results. Across the 44 schools they support, more than 9,000 children have been educated or are currently in education, gaining opportunities for a brighter future.
AFD’s donation is helping to cover the running costs of these schools, as well as providing essential equipment and additional classroom space.
“I chose this charity because they bring education and opportunity to Christian communities in Pakistan, helping children build brighter futures and stand strong in their faith.”
Neville Hilton – Sales Team
All the organisations we have partnered with and the incredible work they do can be seen at www.afd.co.uk/charity.
After 30 years, what’s still in the founding DNA of The Postcode People? A huge part of the answer is the influence of John Dolman, who sadly passed away from a major heart attack at his home in Canada on 24th July 2025.
John was there at the beginning when AFD conceived and launched its first Postcode products and was also once an AFD Director. We are extremely sad to have lost him; however, we are also incredibly grateful to have known him, and we can recall many happy stories. These show who John was and how his faith, creativity, energy, action and skills have helped to shape what AFD is today.
John was the son of a miner, who sadly died when John was just 15. Three years later John became a Christian and worked as a Christian Evangelist, Worship Leader and Musician. He wrote songs, ran a music shop and toured. In 1991 John brought this faith, creativity, energy and action into the foundational years of AFD Software.
On the job at AFD, which mainly served the charity sector in those days, with sheer hard work and a great sense of humour John mastered IT networks, system building and training. During the AFD transition to become “The Postcode People”, John made sure that in 1994 AFD Postcode lookup was the first on CompuServe (a precursor to the Internet) – then a few years later the only place on the Internet you could get Postcode lookup!
The AFD team always dive in to understand and respond to support requests with speed, knowledge, openness to learn – and a solution focus. That approach is part of John Dolman’s “can-do, will-do, done” DNA living on.
When John’s creative energy was applied to marketing it was full-on! He put AFD on the map, organising and attending over 20 conferences and exhibitions in just 18 months! He engaged late nights on technical forums – making sure developers knew we were there for them – and driving our understanding of what they needed and wanted. Nothing was done by halves.
John had time for other passions. While working at AFD, he continued with local church leadership and a strong call to serve the hidden church in China. Although John was a risk-taker this was not with a “cavalier” attitude. It was with awareness, wisdom, insight and taking full responsibility – and it moved things forward.
John became a Director at AFD in 2003 when MD David Dorricott’s first wife Ann passed away, briefly taking the helm and giving David essential practical support during a time of crisis.
John described himself as a right-hand man, activist, energiser, doer, and completer. We agree whole-heartedly.
Beyond John’s passion for China were music and family. In 2004 he and his wife Chris moved to Canada to be close to elderly relatives. After moving he continued to serve the church and China and stayed close to AFD, regularly visiting our Isle of Man HQ to stay in touch with the business, and with his friends at AFD.
In October 2021 John was diagnosed with incurable cancer and wasn’t expected to survive for more than a few months. Many prayed for a miracle and that is the word his consultant used to describe his healing which gave John, his family – and us – an extra 3 years – and John died Cancer-free.
The impact of John’s life isn’t over – it’s still influencing countless people across the globe – including you – our customers. We are thankful for his years of service and friendship; sad he is gone from us for now, and grateful for his example of faith in Christ and assurance of eternal life.
In four decades, we’ve learned at AFD that data accuracy builds and protects trust. By contrast, poor data increases internal costs and leads to poor service and lost customers and compromises hard-won reputation.
At AFD Software, we focus energetically on helping you achieve data precision in contact, location and banking data. It’s in our DNA. Why? Because trust is hard to win and easy to lose.
A Tradition of Excellence, Powered by Innovation
Founded in 1901, Western Provident Association (WPA) is no ordinary health insurer. As a non-profit organisation serving more than 400,000 individuals through both direct channels and intermediaries, WPA combines a strong ethical foundation with a deep commitment to customer service excellence. With over £30 million in turnover and around 200 dedicated employees, WPA’s approach has always placed people before profit.
At the core of WPA’s operations is a sophisticated digital infrastructure. From their internal administration systems and call centre to customer-facing portals and mobile apps, every platform is bespoke-designed to deliver seamless, efficient, and secure service at every stage of the customer journey.
“We verify every single address during the customer journey,” explains Kate Gamblin, Senior IT Services Manager at WPA. “Whether a customer is calling in, applying online, using the mobile app, or updating their details through the secure portal, address data plays a pivotal role.”
From generating accurate quotes to issuing policy documents, collecting premiums, identifying the nearest healthcare specialist or highlighting duplicate records – a precise and valid address underpins it all. And for the many customers who prefer to receive information by post, accurate delivery isn’t just expected – it’s essential.
“Address data is fundamental to excellent customer service,” Kate continues. “The process needs to be straightforward, integrated, and 100% reliable across all our systems.”
As part of WPA’s ongoing pursuit of continuous improvement and best value, Kate led a re-tendering process for address validation services. “We’d been with our existing supplier for some time,” she explains, “but as part of our due diligence, we wanted to explore the market and ensure we were getting the best.”
“One of WPA’s key requirements was that any potential supplier must work directly with Royal Mail. This helped narrow the field and helped AFD Software stand out.”
AFD Software have worked directly with Royal Mail since 1994, and the Postcode People at AFD know the definitive Royal Mail Postcode Address File (PAF) better than anyone. In fact Royal Mail chose AFD as the sole producer and distributor of “raw” PAF products on their behalf 15 years ago, and they still trust us to do so to this day. Our expertise to examine, process, and deliver these products to all consumers of raw PAF is now relied upon by over 50,000 organisations and millions of individuals. Every day. Across the world.
“I would absolutely recommend the service. From integration to ongoing support, everything
has been well-executed. We expect a lot from our suppliers and the Postcode People at
AFD more than measured up to our expectations.”
Kate Gamblin, Senior IT Services Manager
With security and system uptime being two of WPA’s highest priorities, AFD Software had to prove that they could deliver on both fronts. Although address data isn’t stored by AFD , WPA needed confidence that there was no risk of data breach. And with live customer services running around the clock, reliability and high availability were non-negotiable.
AFD delivered, and from day one, the collaboration proved successful.
“Our developers found the documentation incredibly easy to use,” Kate recalls. “It was clear, straightforward, and intuitive. There were no follow-up questions, which really set the tone for a smooth rollout.”
The ability to run parallel systems during the transition helped ensure zero disruption. And the engagement with AFD’s account management team remained open, responsive, and aligned to WPA’s own high standards of service.
The switch to AFD Software may have happened quietly in the background – but its impact runs deep. With robust, secure, and easy-to-integrate address validation now in place across every WPA platform, both staff and customers benefit from fast, smart address data entry.
WPA’s experience highlights the value of re evaluating even the most foundational parts of your systems. Sometimes, it’s the details – like ensuring every address is correct – that make the biggest difference to the service your customers feel.
The WPA journey to better address data started with a conversation.
You can talk to Joel about any aspect of how to improve contact and bank data quality by calling 0333 433 0711 or email postcode@afd.co.uk.
Validating contact data when it is entered is best practice, but what’s the solution when people bypass validation forms or your organisation uses legacy contact databases?
That’s where AFD Refiner comes in. It’s our powerful data cleansing solution that does the heavy lifting by validating, correcting, and enhancing your *address, email, and phone data in bulk. Fast, accurate, and easy to deploy (hosted service or locally on your infrastructure), Refiner is trusted by organisations like Go.Compare, DPD, and Beaverbrooks who know that clean data underpins great customer service.
As one customer put it: “AFD helps us ensure rapid, reliable address data integrity. Saving even just a few minutes per driver boosts deliveries and reduces stress, getting drivers on the road faster with more time to serve customers.”
Gurnam Singh, Enterprise Architect at DPD.
During the cleansing process, Refiner can append a host of address-linked datasets from property age, type, and value to demographic data about the occupants.
| Cleansing | Inaccurate address data | |
| Highlighting | Invalid emails and phone numbers | |
| Flagging | Contacts who have moved or died | |
*Address data cleansing can be achieved only when there is enough information in the input address to achieve a unique match. “18, HD3 2” would not match to a unique address. “18, HD32af” would.
AFD offers a free Contact Data Health Check to highlight the accuracy of your data. It’s secure, quick, and comes with tailored advice from a Postcode People Data Quality Expert on how to fix errors and prevent inaccuracy in the future.
Start your health check today at: www.afd.co.uk/healthcheck
We serve thousands of organisations and a network of hundreds of partners across multiple industry sectors, enabling them to have full confidence in their contact data.