Like many institutions, not just postal ones, wishing to streamline its operations, Poczta Polska implemented an Automatic Data Capture (ADC) system using barcodes.
In order to ensure the most effective implementation of barcodes, and in the future also the exchange of documents in the form of standard electronic messages (Electronic Data Interchange – EDI), the implementation of the ADC system was based on GS1 global standards (formerly known as EAN.UCC). Only such an approach takes into account the needs and internal conditions of Poczta Polska and any other company, while at the same time being consistent with global standards, thanks to which it also meets the needs of current and future customers, both domestic and foreign.
Why GS1 global standards were applied
Among existing barcode applications, one can distinguish individual, industry-specific, and global (universal) solutions. Poczta Polska did not decide on a solution based on GS1 global standards immediately. In the initial phase, the company worked on its own internal solution. Unfortunately, many companies from various sectors follow this path.
1. Individual solutions for barcodes
In individual solutions, any barcode symbologies can be used (there are several hundred types) with the exception of so-called secure symbologies, that is, those reserved exclusively for the global standard, for strictly defined applications (global, national, and internal). The recommendations of the Universal Postal Union (UPU) take such solutions into account (referred to as “private”), however, they can only be used within a given company. It should be realized that these are the least effective solutions because:
– they cannot be used by the company for contacts with its environment
– they cannot be used by the company to improve other functions that the company performs (which use global standards).
In such a situation, the company must use separate ADC systems, which always increases costs.
2. UPU recommendations regarding the use of barcode standards
After about two years of attempts at internal solutions, Poczta Polska began to consider implementing an ADC system based on solutions that were international, but only of an industry-wide scope. For this purpose, solutions prepared for this industry by the Universal Postal Union were considered – industry standards S24-1 and S26-1. At the same time, the UPU recommends that postal enterprises using S24-1 and S26-1 be able to process information about shipments recorded in other standards compliant with European Standards: EN1572 and EN1573, including the GS1 global standard. UPU guidelines also recommend that a company using its own solutions should also use global and industry standards if its partners use them (in Poland, Poczta Polska’s customers use GS1 global standards). However, it should be remembered that in the case of using internal and industry solutions, many types of code symbologies are used, which means that such a company would have to use several or several dozen solutions in parallel, adapting unsecured symbologies used by individual companies according to their internal solutions. Such an assumption creates a high cost for both the devices and the solutions used, as well as the use of solutions that are not user-friendly from the point of view of postal workers (for example, if several companies use the same symbology, due to the possibility of duplicating the identifier, there is no automatic way to distinguish them regarding the values of the scanned code data. There is also no protection against scanning codes from documents of companies with which Poczta Polska has not signed an appropriate agreement and for which it has not launched another software module. Therefore, in every case where the sender has their own barcode shipment coding system, Poczta Polska is forced to prepare an interface enabling automatic data entry into its own IT system. The most beneficial solution to these problems is therefore the use of GS1 global standards by both Poczta Polska and its customers.
Implementing barcodes on postal shipments
Based on the above analysis of internal and industry solutions and UPU recommendations, Poczta Polska adopted GS1 global standards for use. Already in 2001, the Director General of Poczta Polska (Jacek Turczyński) issued an appropriate ordinance regarding the barcode in force in the company, regarding the implementation of the ADC system using barcodes for the process of handling shipments and collective packaging. Based on Art. 23 sec. 1 of the Act of July 30, 1999, on the State Public Utility Enterprise “Poczta Polska” (Journal of Laws No. 106, item 675), he ordered the introduction for use in domestic and foreign traffic of the UCC/EAN-128 barcode (current name: GS1-128) for the identification of shipments and collective packaging, according to the EAN.UCC global standard (current name: GS1), while for foreign shipments and EMS-POCZTEX he maintained the used Code 39 barcode, in accordance with the technical standards adopted by the Universal Postal Union. He also obliged the organizational units of CZPP and 9 other organizational units of Poczta Polska to take adjustment measures.
The description of the content of the UCC/EAN-128 code for the identification of shipments and collective packaging in domestic traffic was an attachment to the ordinance. The requirements for Code 128 were given therein according to the PN-EN 799:1999 standard Barcodes – Requirements for the “Code 128” symbology. The attachment to this ordinance presents the “Content of the UCC/EAN-128 barcode for the identification of postal shipments and collective packaging”. In the meantime, it has undergone several modifications, with the current version dating from January 11, 2007 (below we will present the content of this attachment, but only in relation to postal shipments – coding of collective packaging is a topic for a separate article).
The article comes from the magazine “Logistyka” 1/2008.