NEW ZEALAND POSTAL ADDRESSES

'New Zealand postal addresses' follow the same format as much of the English-speaking world. There are four main kinds of address depending on the mode of delivery:

★ Street address, in which mail is delivered directly to homes by the 'postie';

★ PO Box address, in which mail is delivered to a private box, usually at a Post Shop' (formerly Post Office) for collection;

★ Private Bag, in which a private mail bag is delivered to an organisation such as a large company or a government department; and

★ Rural Delivery, used in rural areas for home deliveries.
Postcodes were first introduced in New Zealand in 1977, but these were used entirely for pre-sorting large volumes of mail in bulk, similar to the Mailsort system used by Royal Mail in the United Kingdom. Consequently, post codes were not usually seen in addresses:
:New Zealand Post
:Private Bag 39 990
:WELLINGTON
A new postcode system was introduced in June 2006. Unlike the previous system it will apply to all items of mail, whether sent from within the country, or from overseas, from June 2008.

Contents

New System

Previous system

Māori Names

Freepost

Third party Registered Postal Operators

External links

New System

There are 1850 postcodes, with up to 10000 locations in each code. They start with 0 in Northland and progress southward, ending with codes starting with 9 in Otago and Southland.
In cities and large towns, the last two digits indicate the mode of delivery, as illustrated by addresses in Palmerston North:
'Street address:'
:43 Vogel Street
:PALMERSTON NORTH 4414
'PO Box address:'
:PO Box 4000
:PALMERSTON NORTH 4440
'Private Bag address'
:Private Bag 11222
:PALMERSTON NORTH 4442
'Rural Delivery address'
:Railway Road
:RD 10
:PALMERSTON NORTH 4470
Under the old system a post code was often used for several PO Box number ranges in the same city, but each now has a separate postcode:
:PO Box 51000
:PAKURANGA 2140
:Private Bag 76912
:MANUKAU 2240
:PO Box 38234
:HOWICK 2145

Previous system

New Zealand Post did not require individual items of mail to include the post code in the address, as optical character recognition (OCR) enabled automated sorting machines to scan entire addresses, rather than just post codes, as is the case with older machines. Until the early 1990s, all mail was sorted manually.
Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch were divided into postal zones, which were incorporated into the post code system for use in bulk mailings. For example, for the former Wellington 4:
:Flat 2
:173 Park Road
:Johnsonville
:WELLINGTON 6004
In cities and large towns, the last two digits indicated the mode of delivery, as illustrated by addresses in Palmerston North:
'Street address:'
:43 Vogel Street
:PALMERSTON NORTH 5301
'PO Box address:'
:PO Box 4000
:PALMERSTON NORTH 5315
'Private Bag address'
:Private Bag 11222
:PALMERSTON NORTH 5320
'Rural Delivery address'
:Railway Road
:RD 10
:PALMERSTON NORTH 5321
Each PO Box or Private Bag number range usually had its own postcode, although some covered several number ranges in the same city, for example, in South Auckland:
:PO Box 51000
:PAKURANGA 1730
:Private Bag 76912
:MANUKAU 1730
:PO Box 38234
:HOWICK 1730
'NB:' New Zealand Post required that no space was inserted between the letters 'P' and 'O' in 'PO Box' or 'R' and 'D' in 'RD'.

Māori Names

New Zealand Post recognises Māori names for cities and towns in New Zealand; for example, the Māori Language Commission's address is:
:Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori
:Pouaka Poutāpeta 411
:TE WHANGANUI A TARA 6140
In English, this translates as:
:Māori Language Commission
:PO Box 411
:WELLINGTON 6140
In spite of the considerable difference between the two languages, there was no need to add the post code under the old system, which in this case would have been 6015.

Freepost

Mail to Members of the New Zealand Parliament is delivered free of charge to the sender. The cost is deducted from the Member's budget:
:Rt Hon. Helen Clark MP
:Parliament Buildings
:WELLINGTON 6011
Other Freepost mail includes a unique number as well as the PO Box or Private Bag number:
:CARM
:Freepost No. 112002
:PO Box 913
:DUNEDIN 9054

Third party Registered Postal Operators

Until recently NZ post has had the majority of influence on Private Box rentals. But now DX Mail and Private Box provide an alternate solution for people who need a remote box address.
DX Mail provide a secure alternative to NZ Posts PO box mailing info structure, whereas Private Box actually provide a totally Virtual Solution. Whereby the customer doesn’t even need to pickup the mail is forwarded on to them.
Along with the new competitors in the marketplace NZ post may find it difficult to keep up with the new addressing system. This is why they have set a standard for addressing mail. Nevertheless there are little standards on how competitors can address their mail.

External links

★ New Zealand Post

★
★ New Post Code finder

★
★ Old Post Code finder

★ New Zealand adopts postcodes - article in ''The Times'' June 1, 2006

★ New Zealand enters brave new world of postcodes - article on Nine Network website, May 31, 2006

★ New Zealand Postcode Latitude and Longitude Database - MySQL database of new NZ postcodes with coordinates and PHP script to calculate proximity and distance of nearby postcodes

★ New Zealand Postcode Database - downloadable MySQL database of new NZ postcodes

★ DX Mail

★ Private Box