House has mystery name....can I use it officially?
Discussion
We live in a victorian terrace and all the houses just have names. The road its on has a mix of terrace and detached houses. Ours has its own postcode (as i pressume do the others)and there are no numbers along the road. The postie never has a problem but when we get deliveries from couriers we quite often get a "where are you" call.
So, not all houses have numbers, even on regular streets.
Edit: Our road is in a reasonable large town and not a village or rural location
So, not all houses have numbers, even on regular streets.
Edit: Our road is in a reasonable large town and not a village or rural location
Edited by Earthboundmisfit on Wednesday 16th October 13:15
Our place in Cornwall is called The Cottage. Not an unsual choice and quite appropriate for it. Also quite appropriate for several other properties nearby on (more or less) the same road. Hence, when English Heritage did a drive by grade 2 listing, the letter they sent was delivered to another The Cottage. Ten years later, having done loads of stuff not allowed on a listed building, the owners discovered they were listed when our solicitor asked for the planning permission for the changes - cue much conversation with NCDC about plastic conservatories and the like.
Names can have their disadvantages as well.................
Names can have their disadvantages as well.................
My father built our new place in the sixties, for many years it was not named and just known as "The new house" and the village name. It was a small village in the middle of nowhere, so that worked fine until my uncle built a new house on the next road; so we became The new house, xxxxx Road and the village name. Then someone built a new house next door, so my mother named the house; it's been invisible ever since, despite having a nameplate out by the road.
The bump has reminded me that I posted in this thread previously. I'd tried to add my house's name to the Royal Mail database a couple of years ago. Finally noticed a week ago that they'd got it - now it has two entries in the postcode database though; the original entry with just the number and now the extra entry with name and number 
Only taken them a couple of years to add it...
Only taken them a couple of years to add it...The house we bought last year had a name on it only - in the post code database however it was numbered. It's in a village, so there's quite a mixture of houses with names only, numbers only and some with both, so not unusual for our road.
As a result, postie was fine, but deliveries were less so. Even if we specified the name of the house when ordering things, the address label would often only have the number on it, and in the end we got fed up with deliveries constantly missing our house. I put a number plate onto the gate posts, and we hardly bother using the name now.
I'd recommend just getting a name plate made up with your desired name to put on the house and just leaving it at that. It doesn't seem worth the hassle of losing the number.
As a result, postie was fine, but deliveries were less so. Even if we specified the name of the house when ordering things, the address label would often only have the number on it, and in the end we got fed up with deliveries constantly missing our house. I put a number plate onto the gate posts, and we hardly bother using the name now.
I'd recommend just getting a name plate made up with your desired name to put on the house and just leaving it at that. It doesn't seem worth the hassle of losing the number.
Gosh that was a year and a bit ago!
I've don't nothing about it but according to my neighbour who has lived here since 1955, not all the houses had names. As far as she knows the names were never anything more than unofficial.
Indeed looking at old electoral rolls, the houses have always been numbered.
It's just a name I'll use for fun I think. My name, house name, number, street, town, postcode.
I've don't nothing about it but according to my neighbour who has lived here since 1955, not all the houses had names. As far as she knows the names were never anything more than unofficial.
Indeed looking at old electoral rolls, the houses have always been numbered.
It's just a name I'll use for fun I think. My name, house name, number, street, town, postcode.
Jobbo said:
The bump has reminded me that I posted in this thread previously. I'd tried to add my house's name to the Royal Mail database a couple of years ago. Finally noticed a week ago that they'd got it - now it has two entries in the postcode database though; the original entry with just the number and now the extra entry with name and number Only taken them a couple of years to add it...
If you'd emailed their database people directly you'd probably have got it updated within a matter of hours/days! Only taken them a couple of years to add it...At least I'm assuming that works for residential (I pinged them a note to add a new office address and they had it done same day).
LooneyTunes said:
Jobbo said:
The bump has reminded me that I posted in this thread previously. I'd tried to add my house's name to the Royal Mail database a couple of years ago. Finally noticed a week ago that they'd got it - now it has two entries in the postcode database though; the original entry with just the number and now the extra entry with name and number Only taken them a couple of years to add it...
If you'd emailed their database people directly you'd probably have got it updated within a matter of hours/days! Only taken them a couple of years to add it...At least I'm assuming that works for residential (I pinged them a note to add a new office address and they had it done same day).
This thread is interesting to me because I’m currently encountering a load of officious nonsense from our local authority (Scarborough Borough Council) regarding our house name.
In August this year my wife and I bought a detached bungalow in a village near Whitby, so I wrote to SBC and gave them the necessary information for council tax purposes etc. In my letter I gave our full address, which includes a house name and a house number. When they sent us our first Council Tax Bill they omitted the house name which, given that we have a house number, is what I expected they would do. Anyhow I wrote to them again and asked if they would be kind enough to add the house name to their records/database and include it on future council tax bills or other communications. They refused to do so, and this is what they said:
“Unfortunately in regards to the house name, this is not something that we can just add to the address from you having included it in your letter. However now that you have made us aware that you wish for your property to have this house name included officially in the address then there is a procedure that you will have to follow as the planning department have to check that the house name you wish to use is acceptable and that it is not already in use etc and there is a fee attached to this procedure.
In order to have a house name added to your address this has to be done officially through our planning department and I enclose the relevant application forms for you to complete and return together with the fee of £25.00. If you have any queries regarding this you can find more information on our website or please contact the planning department direct, details as shown on the enclosed application form.
The planning department will inform my office of any changes that are to be made and my records will be updated accordingly. The Planning department will also inform other relevant bodies such as the post office, emergency services and the utilities which will enable them to update their records also.
I trust this letter has clarified the matter however should you have any further queries please do not hesitate to contact my office."
Yours sincerely
(name)
Local Taxation Manager.
As far as I am concerned their letter reveals a load of bureaucratic nonsense. I can see no reason why they can not simply do as I have asked. It is easy to do, and no harm whatsoever would be caused.
Across the whole range of residential properties, the vast majority of houses have a number, and no name, and the use of house numbers is clearly the best arrangement for those who need to locate properties. This is particularly important for the emergency services, should they need to find a property quickly. I am well aware that in rural areas it is often the case that houses have names but no numbers, and while I see this as a nice arrangement, it does make life difficult for people who do not have local knowledge of which properties are where. Therefore, the house number is the important bit of information, and the emergency services will probably have no interest in a house name: they will probably ignore it and work from the number, which makes sense.
One can readily appreciate that where new residential areas are being developed, including the building of new roads and new houses adjacent to them, the roads need to be named and the houses need to be numbered in a logical manner. This is something that might well be done by a local authority planning department, but there is no justification for demanding compliance with a procedure or system the way SBC are doing in this case.
Our property has had the same house name for above 40 years, and in fact it is shown in Land Registry documents. I have notified numerous bodies of our full address, complete with the house name, and this includes utility companies and other businesses, and it includes several government departments, and they have all accepted the use of the house name and they use it when communicating with me. The only one refusing to cooperate is our idiotic Scarborough Borough Council.
In August this year my wife and I bought a detached bungalow in a village near Whitby, so I wrote to SBC and gave them the necessary information for council tax purposes etc. In my letter I gave our full address, which includes a house name and a house number. When they sent us our first Council Tax Bill they omitted the house name which, given that we have a house number, is what I expected they would do. Anyhow I wrote to them again and asked if they would be kind enough to add the house name to their records/database and include it on future council tax bills or other communications. They refused to do so, and this is what they said:
“Unfortunately in regards to the house name, this is not something that we can just add to the address from you having included it in your letter. However now that you have made us aware that you wish for your property to have this house name included officially in the address then there is a procedure that you will have to follow as the planning department have to check that the house name you wish to use is acceptable and that it is not already in use etc and there is a fee attached to this procedure.
In order to have a house name added to your address this has to be done officially through our planning department and I enclose the relevant application forms for you to complete and return together with the fee of £25.00. If you have any queries regarding this you can find more information on our website or please contact the planning department direct, details as shown on the enclosed application form.
The planning department will inform my office of any changes that are to be made and my records will be updated accordingly. The Planning department will also inform other relevant bodies such as the post office, emergency services and the utilities which will enable them to update their records also.
I trust this letter has clarified the matter however should you have any further queries please do not hesitate to contact my office."
Yours sincerely
(name)
Local Taxation Manager.
As far as I am concerned their letter reveals a load of bureaucratic nonsense. I can see no reason why they can not simply do as I have asked. It is easy to do, and no harm whatsoever would be caused.
Across the whole range of residential properties, the vast majority of houses have a number, and no name, and the use of house numbers is clearly the best arrangement for those who need to locate properties. This is particularly important for the emergency services, should they need to find a property quickly. I am well aware that in rural areas it is often the case that houses have names but no numbers, and while I see this as a nice arrangement, it does make life difficult for people who do not have local knowledge of which properties are where. Therefore, the house number is the important bit of information, and the emergency services will probably have no interest in a house name: they will probably ignore it and work from the number, which makes sense.
One can readily appreciate that where new residential areas are being developed, including the building of new roads and new houses adjacent to them, the roads need to be named and the houses need to be numbered in a logical manner. This is something that might well be done by a local authority planning department, but there is no justification for demanding compliance with a procedure or system the way SBC are doing in this case.
Our property has had the same house name for above 40 years, and in fact it is shown in Land Registry documents. I have notified numerous bodies of our full address, complete with the house name, and this includes utility companies and other businesses, and it includes several government departments, and they have all accepted the use of the house name and they use it when communicating with me. The only one refusing to cooperate is our idiotic Scarborough Borough Council.
I lived in three houses with names when I was younger:
Vine Cottage
The Old Rectory
The Old Manor
Parcels always arrived but an effort was made to put the name somewhere obvious in all cases to make life easier. The postmen obviously learn pretty quick but for one off deliveries it can make life more challenging.
It always amuses me to see generic houses with made up names, sort of thing Mrs Bucket might pull.
Vine Cottage
The Old Rectory
The Old Manor
Parcels always arrived but an effort was made to put the name somewhere obvious in all cases to make life easier. The postmen obviously learn pretty quick but for one off deliveries it can make life more challenging.
It always amuses me to see generic houses with made up names, sort of thing Mrs Bucket might pull.
The house I moved to in December 2012 has a name and number - it appears as two entries in some records. As it has a number we use that only because of all the usual difficulties with deliveries so we don't bother to tell anyone the name. Frankly, adding a name where is a number and wanting it on all correspondence seems, in some cases anyway, a bit pretentious. Insisting on name only when there's a perfectly good number is counterproductive and defeats the point of an address in the first place.
The firm I worked for a few years ago bought the lease on a building in Borehamwood and it had a number only although no-one else in the road used a number. This was because it was occupied by GEC-Marconi previously and they apparently did classified work and wanted to keep a low profile; up to not even putting the company name outside. We changed it to xxx Ltd and a new name but we had to jump through hoops to be allowed to use the name instead of the old number.
A house I was tempted to buy in Creetown, near Newton Stewart in Dumfries and Galloway, five or six years back had no number and no road either. It was simply: Name, Town, County (Wigtownshire), and postcode. The postcode dropped you outside the access lane and there was only one other house up that lane anyway. Different places, different practices...
The firm I worked for a few years ago bought the lease on a building in Borehamwood and it had a number only although no-one else in the road used a number. This was because it was occupied by GEC-Marconi previously and they apparently did classified work and wanted to keep a low profile; up to not even putting the company name outside. We changed it to xxx Ltd and a new name but we had to jump through hoops to be allowed to use the name instead of the old number.
A house I was tempted to buy in Creetown, near Newton Stewart in Dumfries and Galloway, five or six years back had no number and no road either. It was simply: Name, Town, County (Wigtownshire), and postcode. The postcode dropped you outside the access lane and there was only one other house up that lane anyway. Different places, different practices...
Edited by motco on Tuesday 25th November 17:48
Jobbo said:
Jobbo said:
If you have a number already you can't lose that
Just quoting myself because it seems to have been missed.You can't get rid of the number if you have one; the Post Office will always know the property by the number and everyone you deal with who auto-completes your address from the postcode will use that same database.
I've known online forms where they require a house number and postcode, and if you have no number but try to enter a house name, it doesn't work.
AC43 said:
theironduke said:
But for a lot of rural properties there are no street names and ergo no numbers.
Yeah fair enough. But the OP is considering ditching the existing number and swapping it for a name.The chances of that change rippling successfully through all the IT systems concerned now and in the future without causing problems is a big fat zero.
It's a nice idea but in the real world it will cause lots of unintended consequences.
What annoys me is all the faffing about needed to get a house name recognised, when there is an existing number.
It should be a simple matter to get a name added on request: it causes no problem, so long as the property already has a number, as ours does.
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