$re = '/([a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z0-9]{1,3}) ?(\d[a-zA-Z]{2})/im';
$str = 'EC1A 1BB
A9A 9AA
A9 9AA
A99 9AA
AA9 9AA
AA99 9AA
EC1A1BB
A9A9AA
A99AA
A999AA
AA99AA
AA999AA';
$subst = "$1 $2";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php