Postcode Address Counts and XYZ Boundaries - Sector Level

XYZ Postcode Sector Boundaries with Added Counts of the Number of Addresses in the Royal Mail PAF file for the years 2004 to 2015 divided into the categories Residential (R), Non-Residential (N) and Large User (L) and with a grand total. Please note the counts were not calculated in 2013. The counts are based on the Q3 (August) PAF release each year.

The Postcode Sector Boundaries have been upgraded to our New "Xtreme Accuracy" Standard. This means the Boundaries were re-Digitised so they not only fit around the Postcode Points but now follow Real Physical Features on Air Photography, such as Streams, Railways, Fences, Walls and Roads. You can zoom in to Street Level accuracy at around 1:10 000 scale.

Postcode Sectors are the third level of the UK postcode system and are indicated by the number after the space in the postcode. There are about 11,000 sectors in total across the country. Physically they might cover a very small area in Inner London or be very large in the Highlands, but the total number of addresses in each one is relatively similar at around 2,500 on average. Some sectors are 'non-geographic' as they relate solely to large users (e.g. the Newcastle Pensions Centre or Royal Mail Philatelic Office in Edinburgh) or PO Boxes. These are one of the most widely used datasets in digital mapping, typically for sales and marketing where they can be used for analysis (e.g. thematic maps) or for constructing sales territories. The Nov 2016 Version is current to the Q3 PAF release. Approximately 20 postcode areas have been completely revised since the May 2016 release. The only areas not yet upgraded are Scotland outside Edinburgh and Glasgow, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands.

The product contains:

• Postcode Area polygons
• Postcode District polygons
• Postcode Sector polygons
• Postcode Area, Postcode District and Postcode Sector boundary lines

The lines should be styled to show the type of boundary (Area, District or Sector) and do not include the coastline.

The standard formats available are for ArcGIS Shape Files, MapInfo Professional Tab files or Google KML files. Please select which format you require and then download the appropriate Zip file.

The attribute columns comprise:

• PCode_Sec  - The Sector such as EH22 2
• PCode_Dist  - The District such as EH22
• PCode_Area  - The Area such as EH
• PCode_Num  - The numeric part of the District such as 22
• Post_Town  - The Royal Mail 'post town' for the area, such as Edinburgh
• Area_SQKM  - number of square kilometres in the sector polygon
• Columns for the Total, R (Residential), N (Non-residential) and L (Large User) counts for each year.
• Author
• Scale  - Used in the XYZ data model as the display scale, but not relevant to postcodes.
• Revised
• Code  - the feature code (38.01 = Areas, 38.02 = Districts, 38.03 = Sectors)