In July 2015, Eire’s (southern Ireland’s) new postcode system “Eircode” was launched – which gave every single one of the 2.2 million letterbox addresses in Ireland its own unique Eircode. Prior to the introduction of Eircode, over 35% of addresses were not uniquely identifiable, making deliveries and identification of individual properties difficult.

Previously, organisations and people sending mail and parcels were entirely reliant on the local knowledge of the postie or courier. In addition, insurance and financial institutions had been unable to specifically identify an individual’s address, exposing themselves to expensive risks from potentially fraudulent house insurance claims and financial applications for loans, credit cards and mortgages. Even if no fraud was intended, the margin for error and potential for confusion was huge with many individuals (including some possibly with the same name) often sharing the same address.

Coinciding with the launch of the new system, AFD added Eircode data validation to its range of solutions, allowing organisations to validate and lookup Irish* addresses with an Eircode (*Northern Irish addresses have always been an integral part of AFD’s products based on the United Kingdom Postcode Address File).

Continual development and improvement are core to AFD’s success and maintaining and satisfying high customer expectations. Our Eircode solution has recently been rebuilt from the ground up to significantly speed up the time it takes to find and return every single one of the 2.2 million letterbox addresses in Ireland, and improve the speed with which vital data updates can be provided. Improvements have also been made to make the quality of data even better and search capabilities have been enhanced, making Irish addresses easier to locate.