Royal Mail announces proposals for updated PAF licence

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05/11/2008


Royal Mail’s Address Management Unit has announced its initial proposals for the new PAF® (Postcode Address File) licence.

PAF® contains all known UK residential and business delivery addresses and postcodes. The aim of the proposed changes is to introduce a licence that will be clearer and fairer to all users.

The proposed changes have been developed based on feedback from PAF® users of all types and sizes on how Royal Mail could improve the current licence and make it work better for businesses. Royal Mail is holding a further formal consultation from 5th November to 24th December to allow both resellers of PAF® products and direct customers to share their views and opinions on the proposals.

The new PAF® licence and a new price tariff will be published in April 2009. The changes to the licence will be revenue neutral for Royal Mail and will come into effect from September 2009.

The proposed changes include:

• Reduction of ‘Per User’ fee to £75 a reduction of 50% on 2006 prices
• Introduction of new Multiple User bands
• Introduction of new unlimited Internal Transaction licensing
• Removal of System and Multi-System prices
• New Extended user Group options
• New Postcode Area Plus licensing
• New second level Third Party Solutions provider option
• Reduced Data Supply prices
• A three year contract from 1 September 2009 with a 12 month notice period for any changes

To ensure a smooth transition Royal Mail will allow resellers to stay on their existing agreements until 31 December 2009.

In addition Royal Mail is introducing a new online royalty return system to make administration easier.

Giles Finnemore, Head of Marketing at Royal Mail’s Address Management Unit said: "Our initial proposals have been developed based on input from our customers who wanted a fairer and more flexible licence agreement which would work better for their businesses.

"We are holding a formal consultation period and encourage all PAF® users to share their views on the proposals so that we can ensure that the final licence agreement is an accurate representation of the requirements of current marketplace."

PAF® was originally designed to help Royal Mail postmen and women route and deliver mail. Since its introduction almost 50 years ago, the way in which it is used has diversified and grown enormously.

PAF® is now at the core of a wide range of systems and solutions operating in many industries. In addition to PAF® usage by direct marketing and data capture companies, mail order and online retailers use software built around PAF® to process orders, whilst financial services organisations rely on PAF to calculate car and home insurance assessments. PAF® data is also heavily used in geographic positioning systems such as SatNav and by national and local government.

For information on the consultation visit http://www.royalmail.com/consultations, or email amu_consultation@royalmail.com.

Ends

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