1. My barcodes scan fine with my Smartphone

By design, a barcode scanner must use a laser-emulating red light. Smartphones use ambient light or white light. Scanners cannot see anything printed in red, and green backgrounds appear to be black. Your smartphone may be able to scan barcodes a scanner cannot.

Smartphones may not identify the barcode type—they just read what they see. Is the barcode a Code 39?  Is it a Code 128? Are the data fields correctly prefixed and parsed? Are the wide and narrow bars and spaces the specified width? Is the check digit correct? A smartphone will neither know nor care.

2. We’ve never had a barcode problem

Never having a problem does not mean you have never come close to a disaster—you just don’t know about it. Your belief may be the sand your head is stuck in. The past does not define the future unless you know the variables and control them.

3. We print from a customer-provided file

A customer-provided file may not be properly compensated for gain, with bar-width reduction.  The barcode may be too small or needlessly truncated. The intentions may be good, but the outcome could be worse than if the printer, or a professional barcode file builder, generates the barcode file. The printer knows their process, the press and the press operator. When a barcode fails and the liability is assigned, nobody will be immune. Not the brand owner and not the printer. Worse still is the damage to your reputation and the confidence your customer had and lost.

4. Modern scanners can read anything

Aggressive scanners may be able to decode bad barcodes, but potentially at the cost of accuracy. Extracting incorrect data from a bad barcode can be much worse than failing to scan. Don’t be falsely comforted by the “beep”—it could be a very expensive lie.

5. Digital printing eliminates problems

A digital process does not eliminate all printing variables. Ink spraying through a 10 micrometer aperture is not guaranteed to produce a 10 micrometer image. Variables such as ink viscosity, nozzle pressure, distance from substrate, substrate porosity and transport speed all affect the quality of the barcode image.