Ireland is getting a new system of postcodes, and after much speculation, a date for when we'll all get our numbers has been revealed.
The new system, known as Eircode, will see every household in Ireland get sent the numbers in the last two weeks of June. According to The Journal, the delay in getting the system up and running was due to the fact that there were concerns over data protection, and the legislation implementing the codes was only passed in February.
The system will give a code to every property in the country, from houses to apartments, with the code broken into two different parts, with the first part identifying the area, and the second part being a randomly generated combination of numbers and letters that identifies the address. As the company in charge of rolling out the system points out on their site, your address won't be affected, the postcode will simply be added to the end of your address.
Via Eircode
Apparently the unique identifier will be completely random, meaning that neighbours might have totally different identifiers. The codes themselves will be of benefit not only for postage, but for deploying emergency services to the right address, and saving what could be precious minutes on those occasions, but some people have criticised the random nature of the code as being confusing, and may actually have the opposite effect.
Via The Journal. Main pic via Tobias Abel/Flickr
