This field identifies the postcode of the student's permanent or home address prior to entry to the course. It is not necessarily the correspondence address of the student.

All entrants where EntryProfile.DOMICILE = XF, XG, XH, XI, XK, XL, GG, JE or IM and Instance.REDUCEDI = 00 or 01

To monitor student population by source location, especially in the widening participation context.

A typical postcode such as GL50 3DA would be coded with a blank in the fifth character position. A postcode such as B1 6SR would have a blank in position 3. The part of the postcode before the space is known as the outward part of the postcode and can be 2, 3 or 4 characters long. The part of the postcode after the space is known as the inward part of the postcode and is a fixed length of 3 characters. The space between the outward and inward parts of the postcode must always be shown as part of the postcode.

UK domiciled, for the purposes of this field, means domiciled in England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Channel Islands or Isle of Man.

In the event that the full postcode is not known, institutions must return at least the outward part. The first part of the postcode (the outward part) is essential for allowing HESA to do geographic analysis.

For students entering through UCAS this information will be available from UCAS via the *J transaction

Information about postcodes and postcodes for known addresses can be obtained from Postcodes Online at:www.royalmail.com.

Country of domicile is collected in EntryProfile.DOMICILE.

If no valid postcode (full or outward only) can be ascertained an empty element should be returned with the ReasonForNull attribute set to 1 (not known), i.e:

           <POSTCODE ReasonForNull="1"></POSTCODE>

British Forces Post Office (BFPO) postcodes

Where BFPO codes relate to UK locations, institutions will need to locate the Royal Mail equivalent postcode for the base. If this is not known, then an empty element must be returned with the ReasonForNull attribute set to 1 (not known), i.e:

           <POSTCODE ReasonForNull="1"></POSTCODE>

Note that for funding allocations HEFCE, HEFCW and WAG-DCELLS can only use data that includes both the outward and inward parts of the postcode.

There is further guidance on valid postcode formats at: http://www.govtalk.gov.uk/gdsc/html/frames/PostCode-2-1-Release.htm. The business rule structure validation will be slightly less strict than that described in UK Government Data Standards Catalogue, as not all parsers will support the full GDSC definition. All postcodes are validated against valid postcodes at exception.