An alias is secondary barcode that is associated with an item, typically the EAN/UPC code or 'manufacturer's barcode'. EAN codes are also required for uploading items to Google Shopping and some online marketplaces.
Alias barcodes can be scanned in the Point of Sale to add an item to a transaction, as well as in many areas of the Back Office e.g. to search for an item or to add an item to a Purchase Order.
For items imported into your database via SIM, the alias should already be present in almost all cases.
You can also manually add an alias to the product record in the Back Office:
This can be done on an item-by-item basis, or in bulk by using the Import Barcodes function. See the related article for guidance on using this feature.
The current criteria for barcode values are:
- 12, 13 or 14 characters in length (We don’t currently support ISBN, which would be 8 characters)
- Numeric characters only
- Cannot start with 2, 31, 02, 04, 98, 99
- Cannot contain hyphens or dots
This is based on the guidance set out here:
https://www.barcoding.com/blog/barcode-prefixes-and-product-country-of-origin/
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6286293?hl=en-GB
