NCOA is Canada Post’s National Change of Address database that includes 6 years of history of permanent address changes on households and businesses. Whenever a Canadian Resident moves and fills out a change of address form with Canada Post, they are added to the National Change of Address database. This database lists their old address and their new address. The National Change of Address (NCOA) database is incorporated within iAddress™ (available by subscription). Processing your job through NCOA will allow you to update your customer lists with your customers’ new addresses. Additionally, the Canadian Marketing Association’s (CMA) Do-Not-Mail suppression list is included within NCOA module of iAddress™. This list targets those customers who have chosen not to receive marketing mail.
What is returned by NCOA?
When a job is processed through NCOA it will return one of 3 possibilities:
- A Matched record: The name was matched and a new address is returned.
- A Nixie record: The name was matched to a deceased individual or a resident who has moved but did not provide a new address. These records should be removed from the list.
- No match: This resident has not moved or did not inform Canada Post.
Terms of Use Requirements for NCOA
Canada Post requires that all users of NCOA processing services obtain a Terms of Use ID number. This number is assigned after agreeing to Canada Post’s terms of use on their web portal and must be updated annually. This can be reached at the following link:
There are 2 different types of Terms of Use numbers (ToU ID):
Service Provider ToU ID:
- This is required by any company that will be providing NCOA services to their clients.
End User ToU ID:
- This is required by any mail owner that wishes to use the NCOA processing service. If the mail owner is using a Service Provider, they will need to provide this number to their Service Provider before NCOA processing is permitted.