Royal Mail set to delete counties from addresses
Letters should still reach the right address even without the county name, experts say
The names of counties appear set to be dropped from official postal addresses.
Royal Mail has been consulting on a plan to delete counties from the 28 million-strong address database used by companies and public bodies.
It follows complaints by customers to postal watchdog Postcomm about the use of out-of-date county names, such as North Humberside and Dyfed.
Any changes, which will not happen until at least 2013, will not affect deliveries, experts say.
They say the postal service requires a house number, street and postcode for delivery purposes, but the county name is not strictly necessary.
'Vanity attachment'The official address database is known as the Postcode Address File and lists the addresses of every home and business in the UK.
Under its current licence, Royal Mail is required to maintain the database and make it available at a reasonable charge to private companies and public bodies who want to send out items or use it for market research.
Ian Beesley, chairman of the board that advises the Royal Mail on running the database, said county names had become "a kind of vanity attachment".
"People will still use counties, but for postal purposes you don't need it," he told the Daily Telegraph.
He added that some people might get upset as counties were part of the country's heritage, but insisted they were no longer necessary for business and administrative purposes.
In a document on the possible changes in May, Postcomm indicated that it recognised the strength of feeling against the use of out-of-date county information and encouraged Royal Mail to stop providing such information "at the earliest opportunity".
The regulator said this would result in a gradual phasing out over a number of years of instances where people received addressed mail which included the "wrong" county information.
DisruptionEarlier this year, Mr Beesley's board advised the Royal Mail against dropping county listings until 2013 when its licence would be reviewed.
After that there would need to be a transitional period to minimise disruption, it added.
A Royal Mail spokesman said: ";Royal Mail has consulted with PAF (Postcode Address File) users including government departments, solutions providers and postal operators.
"Users have raised concerns at the disruption to their services that the immediate deletion of this data would bring.
"They have requested that Royal Mail continue to provide this information as a separate file until the review of the licence in 2013, and that after this point there should be a transitional period if this data is to be removed."
Your comments:Comments against keeping counties on addresses
Counties should be dropped. I live in what was Mid-Glamorgan about 10 years ago. It is still on the Royal Mail database. My current county is a mouth-full to say and to write. Governments change the names faster than the Royal Mail can keep up with them.
This is really overdue. I'm constantly amazed to hear people stating they live in Middlesex when it ceased to exist before they were born. And while I'm at it, Romford, Barking and Ilford residents... you live in London not Essex!
I support the proposal to drop country names from addresses. I have often wondered why "Glasgow, Lanarkshire" is thought to be necessary, when the postcode says it all. A consequence, however, will be the need to change the numerous websites which require a county name in order for your mail-order to be processed. I hope Royal Mail use the time between now and 2013 to alert suppliers to the need to drop this requirement.
Yes, they should. Especially in Bristol, which is not in Avon any more (nor in Somerset, Gloucestershire or Wiltshire).
I often send letters to the UK and use the postcode but not the county. I've done this for a few years and never had a letter go astray. So who needs them?
The Post Office says all they need is a house number and postcode. So, all these years, I've wasted hours writing out street, town and county names on hundreds of Christmas cards? From now on I'll address the card to Aunt Nelly, 39, and the postcode - for the first time ever my right hand won't be numb on Christmas Day!
Comments for keeping counties on addresses
I think it would be a very bad idea to remove the need to use county names in addresses. If I need to send letters and need the post code I can always use the internet to find the post code but so many people do not have the luxury of a computer at their fingertips to find this sort of information out. And just for the record Romford, Barking and Ilford are in Essex, and if I wanted to send a letter there I would use those town names in the address.
County names should certainly not be dropped from addresses. Counties form an important part of our heritage. It is not up to Royal Mail to decide whether or not to delete our heritage. As far as I recall, we didn't elect them.
This is an utterly stupid move. My current postal address does not contain my village name, but a town 30 minutes from where I live. I already have postal problems if someone makes a mistake with a postcode. No village, no county, who knows what post I will never get.
I think it would cause no end of problems. At least when you had a county on your address, you knew what area your letter was going to. How will dropping the county speed up deliveries? They should concentrate on making the service better and more cost effective, instead of tweaking obscure pointless areas.
I can't see why it is a problem. If county names have changed, why can't Royal Mail just reflect those changes in its database? It already updates its PAF for postcode changes. It isn't exactly rocket science.
If the county is not important, why should Royal Mail care if it is added to envelopes? In my opinion, writing the county along with the name of the town adds to my knowledge as to where in the country that town is located.
It might not be necessary for business or posting purposes but as a police officer seeing a county next to an unknown town or village name on a document such as a driver's licence helps me get an idea where someone is from.
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