Barcodes with letters

Trouble scanning item barcodes? Trouble with NRE or Millennium understanding the barcode? Can't find the record using the barcode?

Some barcodes include alphabetic characters, or letters, as well as numbers.  The letters should always be upper case to work in NRE and Millennium.

You may be scanning a barcode to either (a) store it in NRE or Millennium, or (b) search for the number.

If you can't find the number, or the record, it could be because the barcode didn't get scanned, or because the data was stored incorrectly.

To be sure that the barcode will be searchable, the barcode scanner must read and send letters as upper case.

• See how the "CAPS LOCK" key works on your scanner.  You may need to press it before scanning so that the barcode data will be read or stored correctly with uppercase letters.  Careful; if the barcode is already uppercase, then having CAPS LOCK on may reverse that and send the letter as lowercase.
  
• Or, you may be able to program the scanner to stay in upper case mode.
• And, the scanner may be programmable with a "caps lock override" so that it will read whatever is there, "as is" without trying to convert it.
  

Is it really always uppercase?  But then again ...  there is evidence that lowercase has been entered, stored, and may be searchable in some cases.  The bottom line: it seems to matter, and these tips could help you sort out a problem you're having at your site, or receive someone else's materials that have a different barcode pattern.

The bottom line: recommendation is to use Uppercase when Shipping.