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While it is helpful to have a “significant” Bates prefix (“ACME” versus “A”), brevity is not without merit. Use the “KISS rule”: keep it simple, Simon. Just think how many times you will need to write or enter the prefix. Also, there are computer issues that almost mandate certain syntax. Please use the following conventions when constructing the prefix.

We recommend using the project name for the prefix. In this fashion, each collection, project, Bates and files carry the same name. If you have 5 separate discovery collections, you will have 5 projects, 5 unique Bates prefixes and 5 unique filename prefixes. When it is time to produce, a new Bates scheme can be applied.

Guidelines for creating a correct Bates prefix:

1. No more than 5 characters wide
2. Only use uppercase letters from A to Z
3. Bates prefix should not end in “L”, “O”, “I” or “D”
4. No spaces or hyphens between the prefix and number

Explanations / Examples:

1. Good Bates prefixes include: A, AA, AAA, AAAA, AAAAA.
2. Bad Bates prefixes include: 9A, 9A9, A9, A9-, A-A-A, 0-A-0, A 0001.
3. OCR may mistake certain letters for the numbers “1” and “0”.

Rules for creating a correct Bates suffix:

1. Suffix should be numeric
2. Suffix should be zero-padded to four (4) positions, the ten-thousandths place
3. Suffix should never contain spaces, hyphens, underlines or characters other than 0 through 9.

Good Bates suffixes include: .0001, .9999, .0100
Bad Bates suffixes include: .A, .0A, .A01, .A-1

Examples:
The following two tables will show the identical ranges using proper and incorrect prefixes and suffixes.

Correct Bates ranges:

Incorrect Bates ranges:

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