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New Year. New Approach. The countdown to 2026 is on, and if you want to hit the ground running, it’s time to think about the one thing that can make or break your year: your data. We’ve all heard the saying “start as you mean to go on.” Well, if that start involves messy, inaccurate data, you’re already tripping before you’ve left the starting gates. Clean, accurate customer data is the foundation for everything: smarter campaigns, smoother deliveries, and sales that actually reflect the effort you put in. Without it, you’re fighting uphill from day one. The truth? Bad data isn’t harmless. Every failed delivery, bounced email, or wrong phone number chips away at your bottom line. In the UK alone, dirty data drains an eye‑watering £900 billion a year from businesses. And with 1 in 5 records typically incorrect, each one costs around £81 annually in wasted spend, lost opportunities, or compliance risks. Why it matters? Still need convincing? Here are the stats that show why clean data is non‑negotiable: Confidence in every customer record : Royal Mail PAF makes 3,000–5,000 updates a day - over 1 million a year. Compliance and reduced risk : UK GDPR requires customer data to be accurate and up to date. Get it wrong, and you risk fines of up to £17.5M or 4% of global turnover. Lower delivery failure and service costs : UK businesses lose £1.6 billion a year to undelivered parcels. At £125 per parcel, even small errors add up fast. Protect marketing ROI : 50% of customers walk after a single failed delivery, and 80% won’t come back at all. The Challenge That’s why starting 2026 with a data cleanse isn’t just smart - it’s essential. Clean data means clear visibility, fewer delivery failures, better targeting, and reduced compliance risk - without the operational headache. By tackling bad data upfront, you give yourself the perfect launchpad for growth, instead of joining the many organisations that end up spending 10–30% of their revenue fixing problems after the fact. So here’s the challenge: make 2026 the year you stop letting bad data hold you back. Cleanse it, validate it, and set yourself up for campaigns that connect, deliveries that delight, and results that truly count. The message is clear: dirty data costs growth, trust, and opportunity. By cleansing upfront, you protect your ROI, strengthen compliance, and give yourself the platform to launch a year of real momentum.

Counties are one of those quiet curiosities of UK addressing - the kind of data field that often sparks more debate than you’d expect. Should they be included? Which kind? And do we even need them anymore? As with so many things in data, the answer is: it depends. Three Counties, One Country In the UK, the word “county” doesn’t describe one single thing. It describes at least three - each with its own history, purpose, and quirk: Postal counties were once the backbone of the Royal Mail’s sorting system. They helped machines (and people) get mail to the right place efficiently. But in 1996, Royal Mail officially dropped them, and by 2010, county data was removed from the official address dataset entirely. For the postal system, counties simply no longer exist. Traditional (or historic) counties trace their origins back centuries — the counties of record, land, and local identity. They don’t match today’s administrative borders, but they persist in cultural memory and local pride. To some, these are the real counties of England. Ceremonial counties , meanwhile, are what most modern maps and local authorities recognise today. They loosely align with lieutenancy areas — the basis for everything from local government to BBC weather maps. And just to add another layer, the UK also has metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties used for administration, because nothing in British geography would be complete without a little complexity. So… Do We Still Need Them? For Royal Mail, the answer is simple: no. County names are ignored by modern sorting systems, and they don’t affect delivery. But in the real world of databases, integrations, and overlapping address systems, the answer is less clear-cut. Counties still appear because: Some legacy systems require a county field for validation. Some organisations and couriers still use them for regional routing. And sometimes, humans just like them — they help people orient themselves, especially in places with duplicate town names. It’s a reminder that addresses aren’t just for machines. They’re for people, too — and people often bring context, emotion, and memory into their sense of “place.” The Bigger Picture: One World, Many Formats  Counties are just one example of how geography, history, and technology collide in addressing. Every country — sometimes every region — does it differently. Some use regions, provinces, or prefectures. Some rely on hierarchies of towns and municipalities. Others have no subdivisions at all. For global platforms and data validation providers, that diversity creates a fascinating challenge: how do you standardise something that isn’t standard anywhere? It’s the quiet work of address intelligence — understanding not just where something is, but how people describe it. Why This Matters The goal of address accuracy isn’t to erase local identity or force uniformity; it’s to understand and support variation intelligently. Whether you’re sending a parcel, mapping customer data, or building systems that work across borders, knowing how and why these differences exist is part of getting the data right. So next time you’re faced with that little “County” field — think of it not as a relic, but as a reminder. Behind every address is a history, a structure, and a story. And understanding that story is where true data quality begins.

Fetchify is delighted to announce that we have enhanced our product portfolio with the launch of our data cleansing services designed to help companies remain compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), maintain accurate customer addresses, and limit financial and reputational losses resulting from lost parcels. Royal Mail’s Postcode Address File (PAF) sees over 1,000,000 changes to address data each year. Against the backdrop of GDPR regulations, which stipulate that customer data must be kept up to date, there is increasing pressure on organisations to maintain an accurate picture of their customer database at all times. Businesses failing to comply face fines of up to £17.5 million or four per cent of global annual turnover. Furthermore, with UK businesses losing an estimated £1.6 billion each year due to lost or undelivered parcels, and 50 per cent of customers abandoning a brand after one poor delivery experience, the stakes are increasingly high when it comes to maintaining accurate address details. Data Cleansing tackles this by checking the addresses companies have on file against the PAF, ensuring that every matched address is complete. Not only does the report help businesses maintain accurate records continually, but it also fills in missing details, such as street information and postcodes, and standardises entries to Royal Mail’s specific formatting. Fetchify’s latest service is expected to help retailers stay on top of their GDPR obligations, minimise failed deliveries, cut returns costs, and improve the customer experience. John Griffiths, Account Manager at Fetchify, comments: “Duplicate records cause confusion, missing data undermines marketing efforts, and incorrect formats lead to delivery and communication errors. Perhaps more compelling is the fact that businesses are legally required to maintain accurate details, so it’s imperative that they get it right. Data Cleansing will address all of these issues whilst streamlining the operational efficiency of companies that use it.”

A spotlight on Tracey Moir, Senior Business Development Manager at Fetchify

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An article in Ecommerce News recently put a number to something every online retailer dreads: lost parcels. In Q4 2024 alone, European ecommerce retailers lost €500 million in revenue due to 3.72 million undelivered parcels. That’s roughly €145 per parcel in direct and indirect logistics costs. And while the official rate of “lost” parcels is just 0.06%, the reality – accounting for misdelivery, theft, and reporting gaps – is likely closer to 0.7%. That’s 1 in every 143 parcels. The Hidden Costs of a 'Lost' Delivery For enterprise-scale ecommerce operations, the implications scale fast: Lost product and packaging costs Repeat fulfilment and reverse logistics Customer service team time and refunds Increased churn and checkout abandonment Damage to brand reputation and online reviews So Why Are Parcels Going Missing? Many issues originate in the last mile of the delivery process. The root cause is often poor data quality: Incomplete or inaccurate delivery addresses captured at checkout Manual amendments to address fields by warehouse or courier staff Ambiguous delivery locations (e.g., "front porch") Lack of precise geolocation data for drop-off Inadequate or unverifiable proof of delivery Some losses are unavoidable, but most stem from gaps in ecommerce data validation and fulfilment process transparency. What Retailers Can Control with Smart Logistics Data While you can’t eliminate theft or accidents, you can reduce missed deliveries and failed first attempts through better data validation and delivery insights: Real-Time Address Validation at Checkout Fetchify’s ecommerce address validation tools connect directly with official data sources including Royal Mail PAF and the Multiple Residence dataset. This ensures accurate delivery details for apartment blocks, HMOs, student housing, and more. Unlike generic autocomplete tools, this is verified delivery point data. Rooftop-Accurate Geocoding for Pinpoint Delivery Fetchify’s Rooftop Geocodes assign precise latitude and longitude to verified addresses – helping carriers reach the exact doorstep, not just the postcode centroid. Proof of Delivery with Location and Time Stamping Our data solutions integrate seamlessly with POD technologies, supporting timestamped, geo-tagged delivery images. Customers can also submit geo-located photos during disputes, enabling faster, fairer resolutions. Map-Based Address Confirmation for Shoppers By embedding a zoomed-in map in the checkout process, ecommerce brands allow customers to visually confirm their delivery location. This prevents ambiguous or misentered addresses from the start. Audit Trails and Address Change Tracking Fetchify tracks address field edits and changes across the fulfilment chain, helping to pinpoint where a delivery went wrong and maintain data accountability. Marginal Gains. Major Ecommerce Impact. Smart logistics and address data validation might only reduce parcel loss by fractions of a percent – but the impact is huge: A 0.1% improvement = thousands of saved parcels = millions in recovered revenue Fewer failed deliveries = less pressure on customer support teams Accurate addresses = better first-time delivery success and lower last-mile costs Conclusion: Delivery Accuracy is a Data Challenge Lost parcels aren’t just a logistics challenge. They’re a symptom of poor data validation in ecommerce. From checkout to doorstep, the journey must be powered by precise, verified data. Fetchify helps online retailers solve this problem with address validation, geolocation, and enhanced fulfilment transparency. If you want to stop asking “Whose front door is this?” – start with smarter ecommerce data. Want to improve delivery success and reduce failed parcels? Contact Fetchify to book your free address data health check.

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