Address requirements Deutsche Post

Letters sent to Germany, once printed, are forwarded to Deutsche Post for delivery. From this point onwards, further responsibility lies with Deutsche Post. To ensure that your letters can be processed smoothly and for the agreed prices by Deutsche Post, it is important that the recipient addresses comply with specific requirements.

In this article, we have summarised the most important address requirements of Deutsche Post for you.

Since October 1st 2023, Pingen checks the recipient address of letters to Germany for additional requirements in order to support our customers as well as possible in complying with these requirements. Learn more about the address checks of Pingen

If there are problems processing the recipient's address, Deutsche Post may reject the letter or only deliver it for a surcharge. In such cases, no reimbursement will be made as correct addressing is the sender’s responsibility and the costs cover the additional processing effort. To ensure that the address meets the postal address requirements, we recommend sending a test letter via Pingen and verifying successful delivery. In this way, potential problems can be recognised and rectified at an early stage to ensure smooth delivery.

Address requirements Deutsche Post:

Address positioning

To make the recipient's address clearly legible in the envelope window, the address must be placed within the address area. The following dimensions must be observed:

• Distance from the edge: 22 mm from the left (x), 60 mm from the top (y)
• Address area size: 85.5 mm x 25.5 mm

Address structure

To ensure that the recipient's address can be processed by Deutsche Post, the following order must be respected:

• Salutation (optional)
• Recipient or company name
• Further recipient designations (optional)
• The street and house number or P.O. box and P.O. box number must be stated one line in this order. Additional information such as staircase C, backyard, flat 7 etc must be separated by a double slash (//) after the house number.
• 5-digit postcode and city in one line in this order, without a comma separation between postcode and city. Additional information about the destination country (country code or ISO code) must be omitted.

Important: For Organisations with the default destination country Germany, it is mandatory to omit the destination country name (e.g. Germany, DE-, D-).

Usually accepted by Deutsche Post:

Usually not accepted by Deutsche Post:

Fonts

Deutsche Post defines specific information regarding font formatting:

Font size (height of verse)

• ‍Minimum: 2.3 mm
• Maximum: 4.7 mm
• Recommended font size:
• Recommended font size: 10 pt to 12 pt in "regular" (normal) font style

Character spacing

End of a character to the beginning of the next character:

• Minimum: 0.2 mm
• Maximum: 0.4 mm

Word spacing

‍The space between blocks of digits and words:

• Minimum: 1.0 mm
• Maximum: 4.0 mm
• Usually one or two spaces

Line spacing (weft)

‍Uniform line spacing between the descenders of the top line and the ascenders of the bottom line for the entire address:

• Minimum: 0.5 mm
• Maximum: 2.5 mm

Font & colour

For the recipient's address to be properly read, a clear font with an easily readable font size is mandatory.

• Recommended fonts: Arial, Frutiger, Helvetica, Times or Univers
• Uniform font
• Font colour: Black
• No italics or decorative fonts
• No serif fonts
• No fonts with connected letters
• No 3D or shaded fonts

Usually not accepted by Deutsche Post:

Further details on the design:

Deutsche Post specifies further requirements for address design:

• According to DIN 5008, the address block must be left-aligned
• No blank lines between the address lines
• Uniform line spacing for the entire address
• Neither postcode nor city must be underlined or blocked out.
• Use only Latin characters and Arabic numbers

Usually not accepted by Deutsche Post:

Detailed documentation of the requirements by Deutsche Post can be found here.

Address verification by Pingen (since October 1st 2023)

To help you meet the requirements of Deutsche Post, Pingen checks the recipient address for compliance with additional requirements since October 1st 2023 for letters to Germany.

If Pingen detects that a document does not comply with the address requirements, it will receive the status "Action required" after upload. The "cover page feature" enables you to correct the recipient's address directly via Pingen. This feature automatically adds a new page in front of the document. This allows the address to be re-entered in compliance with the address requirements and placed on the cover page accordingly.

The following requirements are checked by Pingen since October 1st 2023:

Incorrect street and house line

The house number must be placed after the street name. Pingen checks the order of the street name and house number as well as interfering elements within the address line.

Please ensure that the house number is after the street with a space in between and that there are no disturbing characters. So e.g. Musterstraße 1 or Musterstr. 1 (and not "1 Musterstraße" or "Musterstraße., 1" or "Musterstr.1" or "Musterstraße1").

Prohibited content after the house number

Supplementary notes (staircase C, backyard, flat 7) may only be placed after the house number if they are preceded by a double slash (//). Pingen checks whether content has been placed after the house number without the separation of the double slash and that this content is on the same address line.

Please ensure that there is no other information after the house number respectively that it is separated by "//" and that the contents after the "//" are on the same address line. For example: Musterweg 1b or Musterweg 1b // Türe Rechts (and not "Musterweg 1b Türe Rechts" or Musterweg 1b 1b).

Prohibited content after the P.O. Box

If a P.O. Box is specified, it must be on a separate line and no other content may follow the P.O. Box number. Pingen checks whether further content follows the P.O. boy number.

Please ensure that only the P.O. box number is written after the P.O. box. For example, Postfach 123 or Postfach 12 11 13 (and not "Postfach 123, Kst 12345" or "Postfach 12 11 13, 10557 Berlin").

Prohibited content in the postcode line

No other information may be placed in the address line of the postcode and the city. Country designations before the postcode such as DE- or D- are prohibited. Pingen checks whether there is any prohibited content before the postcode.

In addition, there must be no character (such as comma or hyphen) between the postal code and the city. Both information must be separated by a space. Pingen checks if there is a space after the postal code.

Please ensure that the line with the postcode only contains the postcode and the city and that they are separated by a space. For example, 10557 Berlin (and not "10557, Berlin" or "D-10557 Berlin", or "10557 Berlin (Brandenburg)").

Postcode does not have 5 digits

In Germany, postcodes that do not have 5 digits are considered invalid. If a recipient address has a postcode with fewer or more than 5 digits, it will be rejected by Pingen. Pingen checks whether the last or second-last address line contains a 6-digit postcode.

Please ensure that the zip code is a continuous 5-digit number. For example, 10557 Berlin (and not "1055 Berlin" or "10 557 Berlin").

Unsupported ISO country code

The spelling DE-10557 Berlin (i.e. ISO2 country code before the postcode) has not been supported by Deutsche Post for several years. For this reason, Pingen checks whether there is an ISO2 country code (such as “DE-“) on the line with the postcode.

Please ensure that the country name is stated on the last address line and that the address line with the postcode does not have a country designation. For example, 10557 Berlin (and not “DE-10557 Berlin”).

Country name on the postcode line

Deutsche Post mandates that local letters must not include a country designation. Therefore, Pingen checks for Organisations with Germany as the default destination country to ensure that the country name (e.g., “Deutschland” or “Germany”) is not present on the postcode line.

Please ensure that the postcode line contains only the postcode and the city. For example, use 10557 Berlin (and not “10557 Berlin (Germany),” “10557 Berlin, Germany,” or “10557 Berlin Deutschland”).

Country designation on the last address line

Deutsche Post requires that letters from German senders to Germany must not include a country designation. Therefore, Pingen checks for Organisations with Germany as the default destination country to ensure that the country name (e.g., “Deutschland” or “Germany”) is not present on the last address line.

Please ensure that the last line contains only the postcode and the city. For example, 10557 Berlin (and not "Germany")

Invalid address structure (soon)

When sending letters to Germany, it is mandatory to include a recipient name in the address. Furthermore, no empty lines (or lines without content) are allowed between the different address lines. In addition, the address line with the street name/house number or P.O. Box must be followed by the address line with the postcode/city. In addition, neither the address line with the street name/house number nor the address line with the postcode/city may be split over multiple address lines.

Please ensure that the address contains a recipient and no blank lines between the address lines, that the address line with the street name or P.O. box is followed by the address line with the postcode/city and that both the address line with the street name and the address line with the postcode/city are shortened so that they each fit on one address line.

Important:

For technical reasons, Pingen cannot carry out a complete verification of the requirements by Deutsche Post. The address check by Pingen serves solely to help identify various problems before sending the letter. However, it is the sender's responsibility to ensure that letters sent to Germany via Pingen comply with Deutsche Post regulations. Any additional expenses due to incorrect addressing will be charged by Pingen.

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Note: The illustrations in this article are not to scale.