Scottish Postcode Directory (SPD)

The Scottish Postcode Directory (SPD) has been compiled for users by our Geography team. It relates both live and deleted postcodes in Scotland to a range of statutory, administrative, electoral and other area geographies. More information on postcodes is available in our Background Note (Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format (PDF) 3.43 Mb).

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The SPD is made up of two key files:

• Postcode Index
  A file containing both live and deleted postcodes assigned to a variety of geographical areas in Scotland. This Index is accompanied by a database containing various look-up tables to higher geographical areas.
• Postcode Boundaries
  A file containing a digital boundary for every live postcode corresponding with the Postcode Index.

Note – the version of the SPD provided online do not include Royal Mail information on Delivery Point Count (DPC), Delivery Point Count Non-Residential (DPCNR) or Household Count (HC). If you require this information please contact our Geography Customer Services at the e-mail address below.

Availability

The Postcode Index is freely available as text files or as an Access database. Postcode boundaries are available to all members of the One Scotland Mapping Agreement (OSMA) only. They are provided in Esri Shapefile format. The postcode data can be downloaded directly from our website or provided on CD from our Geography Customer Services.
E-mail: geographycustomerservices@nrscotland.gov.uk

Scottish Postcode Directory files

The Scottish Postcode Directory files contains postcode boundaries, index files, metadata and guidance notes. It also contains links to free viewers for the Shape, MapInfo and PDF files.

Supporting Information

• 1991 Census Counts (PDF 133Kb)
• Overlapping Dates (Excel 46Kb)
• Removed English Postcodes (Excel 14Kb)
• GridLink^® Information Note (PDF 133Kb)

Archived Postcode Extract   2012-2 to 2015-2

Consultation

Results from the Postcode Extract Data Dictionary Consultation that ran from November 2014 to January 2015 can be found within the Analysis of Responses document (PDF 43Kb ).