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Issue 7 2014 - Freight Business Journal


Eircode: Postman Padraig’s pratfall?


Ireland is the last country in Europe, and one of the few developed economies in the world, without postcodes. That is set to change next


year with the introduction of Eircode. But the system devised by Capita, a service provider to the UK government which won the Eircode development tender,


has provoked


heated argument because of its failure to embrace GPS technology. Eircode is based on the


Irish Post Office’s (An Post) GeoDirectory, and allocates each of Ireland’s 1.8 million personal and 400,000 business addresses a unique identifier. But only the first half of the code gives any clue to location. Dublin’s existing 25 postal


districts will be retained, explains Neil McDonnell, general manager of FTA Ireland.


The rest of


add geographical coordinates, McDonnell says. “Navigation companies


could act as resellers, but it will be subject to open


market pricing. I’m not sure if


the commercial model stands up if someone like Garmin, TomTom or Navman can suck everything useful out of it and layer their own solution over the top.


“Parcel companies will be wondering, ‘Why would I pay for Eircode, then a middleware fee, if I can just use Google Earth?’ If you’re delivering pizza or flowers, or you’re a taxi driver, you won’t get anything out of it that you can’t get now.” Some rural com-


munities have developed in such a way that several households dotted across a common rather than along a street may share a


the


country will be divided into 24 districts that will be identified by the first three characters, but the remaining four characters of the seven-digit alphanumeric will be entirely random, so a Dublin address of D12 P4J2 could be next door to D12 H3F7. This does nothing to help


with parcel sorting, route planning or address finding on the ground. Delivery firms fear that the random codes will be harder for people to remember - in any case the system will not be mandatory - and will make errors harder to spot. It’s not as if Ireland has rushed


to reach a decision. “This has been kicking around since 2001 under four separate ministers,” says McDonnell. The FTAI is pushing for a meeting with the latest incumbent, Alex White, appointed as communications minister in a government reshuffle in July, to discuss the industry’s concerns. McDonnell says the UK’s


hierarchical postcode system, which “takes you down to smaller and smaller areas, zeroing in on where you want to go,” may be 55 years old but has


Anyone


stood the test of time. “We were hoping for something similar, but a 21st-century solution reflecting the proliferation of GPS.” The global express companies


would have jumped at a UK-style system, but all they have is “a big mailing list,” McDonnell argues. “It won’t go away, because with property tax coming in, and water charges from next year, you need a unique property identifier.” It will provide rich data for


anyone who wants to interact with each domestic or business address such as online retailers and utility companies, he accepts, “but you need a different system for everything else except letter mail, which will die anyway in the next five years.” It is expected that companies


will have to pay around €5,000 to acquire the Eircode database, but to get any practical value in terms of route optimisation, scheduling or accurate tendering for new business, logistics firms would have to go through a middleware provider that would


single address. And the structure of Irish townlands, a subdivision system devised in the 17th century for administrative purposes,


can mean that


someone with a Limerick postal address is physically located in neighbouring Cork, points out Owen Cooke, chairman of The Pallet Network Ireland. “I’m very angry about Eircode They’re lumbering us with the


same old system and it’s nothing to do with location,” he says. “It’s been created to protect An Post’s monopoly and to generate revenue for them and for the government.”


Cooke is minded to start


including the physical coordinates of TPN hubs on its stationery and in all its communications. “A 10-digit code can get you to within five metres, so you can direct people to an individual gate. We already do it for customers and we have all this at no cost.”


• Another issue FTAI wishes to take up with the minister, with a


Transport Bill looming in 2015, is O-licensing.


Irish addresses can be baffling


The association is keen that own-account drivers should be included, as is already the case in Northern Ireland.


More tabby cat than tiger desperately looking


for a job may well disagree, but Irish finance minister Michael Noonan declared the recession over when he presented the 2015 budget on 13 October. Expected growth of around 3-4% over the next three years is hardly Celtic Tiger stuff, but it will help bring down the budget deficit to well below what the Government had expected this year.


Ireland has been in serious


recession since 2008 – one of the longest in its history – banks have failed and, ultimately, the country had to be bailed out by the EU and International Monetary Fund. Construction – one of the key drivers of the Irish Sea freight trade – has been virtually at a standstill. Lately, though,


there have been reports of queues of would-


be buyers outside new housing developments, something not seen since the days when the Celtic Tiger was in its prime. Noonan expects the budget


deficit to fall still further next year, to 2.7% of GDP, well below the 3% level promised to the country’s lenders. Indeed,


Ireland’s efforts to


meet its targets is now being held up as a model for the other


recession-stricken Eurozone economies. But just like the Irish weather,


a few storm clouds are never far away. Noonan also told Irish deputies on 13 October that he had been forced to scrap the so- called ‘Irish Double’ tax loophole that allows companies to move profits out of Ireland to low-tax regimes. The scheme will be closed to new entrants during 2015.


This could lessen Ireland’s


attractiveness as a location for big company HQs; on the other hand, the country’s corporation tax of only 12.5% is still an attraction for many,


although


that has been singled out by other countries as an unfair advantage, so its continuance cannot be absolutely guaranteed. Nevertheless, there seems


to be no shortage currently of biotech and other high value firms seeking to locate in Ireland. The Celtic Tiger may be more


Changed tax rules might make Ireland less interesting as a global HQ location


Celtic Tabby, but she ready to emerge from behind the sofa with claws newly sharpened.


///IRELAND


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