Case Study: Bristol City Council identifies vulnerable families and streamlines data sharing with Ordnance Survey’s AddressBase

Bristol City Council - Customer Case Study

Bristol City Council (BCC) faced the challenge of identifying and supporting vulnerable households enrolled in the Troubled Families programme—working proactively with some 4,200 local families (2015–2020) from around 30 indicators held across multiple partner datasets. To reliably match and merge those datasets and protect personal data, BCC introduced Ordnance Survey’s AddressBase® and its Unique Property Reference Numbers (UPRNs) as the foundation for linking records.

Using Ordnance Survey’s AddressBase®, BCC built a process and infrastructure that overcame technical and legal barriers to data sharing, allowing partners to extract and merge data more quickly and securely. The solution delivered simpler data extraction, improved timely sharing, de-personalised matching until eligibility was confirmed, and enabled strategic spatial and predictive analysis—supporting targeted interventions for thousands of families and more efficient use of public resources.

Bristol City Council

Gary Davies

Troubled Families Co-ordinator