What data do PostCoder® products use?

PAF® is the Postcode Address File owned and updated by Royal Mail. It includes all of the 28 million postal delivery addresses (or delivery points) in the UK (England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland).

As well as containing full and accurate address details, the data also includes:

• Whether the record is a Residential or Non-Residential property, known as 'user category'
• An organisation name and department name if applicable
• A Unique Delivery Reference Point Number (UDPRN), which allows you to uniquely identify delivery points on PAF®
• Country names and codes
• Postzon data (see below)

For the full list of data fields available on PAF® please visit our PAF® section.

MR data provides approximately 400,000 additional addresses to the 28 million already on PAF®. MR data recognises where a single property shares the same letter box for multiple residences and provides a structure for these addresses. Examples are a house that has been converted into 2 or more flats and a university Hall of Residence with 5,000 residents.

Postzon is an additional data file offered with or without PAF®, which includes:

• Grid References for each Postcode
• Local or Unitary Authority Ward codes and names
• Various NHS codes and names

This data is maintained by the Gridlink® consortium comprised of Royal Mail, the Office for National Statistics, Ordnance Survey, General Register of Scotland and Ordnance Survey Northern Ireland.

For a full list of the fields please click here.

The Royal Mail no longer considers a county field to be part of a postally correct address, and therefore does not maintain or update this information. Subsequently, many of the addresses on PAF® don't have an entry for 'county'. In response to customer demand we have developed our own Current County field to make sure each address in the UK has a county entry should this be a requirement for you.

The datasets are used in a variety of ways. They are mainly used by UK businesses for:

• Checking an address from a customer over the phone or from a marketing exercise
• Speeding up address lookup by employees
• Speeding up address lookup by customers online
• Cleaning and updating address records on a customer database
• Sending mail shots to customers

The datasets can also be used for:

• Customers to locate their Nearest store or service provider
• Identifying business or consumer addresses within a set radius of a Postcode for mail shot purposes
• Making online order processes quicker and easier
• Integrating any of these uses seamlessly into a bespoke application

• E-Commerce
• Government
• Telecommunications
• Call Centers
• Customer Management

PAF® is updated on a daily basis by Royal Mail's Address Management Unit from:

• The thousands of delivery staff that work across the UK
• Mailshots and research
• Feedback from customers via or by calling them on 0845 601 1110.

Postzon is updated by Gridlink®, a consortium comprised of Royal Mail, the Office for National Statistics, Ordnance Survey, General Register of Scotland and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland.

Here are a few facts about PAF®:

• 124 Postcode Areas in the UK i.e. NR, M
• Over 2,970 Postcode Districts i.e. NR14, M3
• Over 11,000 Postcode Sectors i.e. NR14 7, M3 3
• Over 28 Million Delivery Points
• Over 1.7 Million Postcodes
• Over 100,000 changes every month