Data protection

[speckytecky]

As we are all (hopefully) in the habit nowadays of shredding any discarded bank statements etc. and many of us rip off and destroy all address panels off any mail received it occurred to me that for some time the Royal Mail have added a double Barcode to the front of all mail. My suspicion is that this contains the address details electronically so I destroy that as well. Am I right?

[kernewek-sam]

As we are all (hopefully) in the habit nowadays of shredding any discarded bank statements etc. and many of us rip off and destroy all address panels off any mail received it occurred to me that for some time the Royal Mail have added a double Barcode to the front of all mail. My suspicion is that this contains the address details electronically so I destroy that as well. Am I right?

I'm not sure if you're right but I destroy mine as well, just in case it does.

[mjs_mjs]

I think it's just the postcode as that's all the automation sorts on i think.

[AngryTechnician]

If we're talking about this one, it normally contains the postcode and what they call a "Delivery Point Suffix", which essentially identifies the individual letterbox that Royal mail deliver to. It does, therefore, represent the individual address (down to building level if you live in a flat with a shared letterbox) - though the data to translate the DPS to the address is not readily available, and most barcode readers can't read the barcode anyway.