Our methodology

Data sources

Our licensing scheme data is compiled from the following publicly available sources:

• Local authority websites

  Council licensing pages, scheme designation documents, and public consultation records. This is our primary source for scheme details, fees, coverage areas, and application links.

• ONS National Statistics Postcode Lookup (NSPL)

  Maps every postcode in England to its ward and local authority. Used under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This is how we determine which council area a postcode falls within.

• ONS Open Geography Portal

  Provides local authority district boundaries as GeoJSON data, used for the interactive map. Used under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

• Planning Data local authority directory

  Used to backfill official council website links across the current 296 local authority districts in England where our manually researched dataset does not yet contain a direct council website URL.

• MHCLG scheme confirmations

  The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government confirms selective licensing schemes that cover more than 20% of a council's area. These confirmations help us verify large schemes.

How postcode lookup works

1. You enter a postcode and submit the check. The postcode is sent to our app so we can match it against the ONS dataset and return the result, but we do not intentionally store individual postcode searches in our own database.
2. We match the postcode to its local authority using the ONS NSPL dataset.
3. We check our database for any licensing schemes operated by that local authority.
4. For borough-wide schemes, any postcode in the area is covered. For ward-based schemes, we also check the ward code.
5. We display the results with confidence indicators and links to the official council source.

Verification process

Each council's licensing data is researched manually by checking the council's website and any published scheme designation documents. We verify:

• Whether the council operates selective, additional, or both types of scheme
• The geographic coverage (borough-wide, specific wards, or custom areas)
• Current licence fees
• Scheme start and end dates
• Application URLs and council contact details

Known limitations

• Scheme changes:Councils can introduce, modify, or end schemes at any time. There may be a delay between a council's decision and our database being updated.
• Ward boundaries: For ward-based schemes, we rely on ONS ward codes. In rare cases, boundary changes or edge-case postcodes may produce inaccurate results.
• Custom areas: Some schemes cover specific streets or custom areas that do not align with ward boundaries. Our postcode checker may not accurately identify these.
• HMO determination: Whether a specific property is an HMO depends on factors we cannot assess from a postcode alone (number of occupants, household composition, building layout).
• Incomplete detailed coverage: We index councils across England, and currently track all 296 local authority districts in the current England boundary dataset. Some councils may not yet have full scheme detail, fee data, direct licensing-page links, or boundary notes in the database.

Help us improve

If you spot an error or know of a scheme change that we haven't captured, please report an inaccuracy. Community corrections help us keep the data accurate for everyone.