I think the 999 codes are what are used for foreign students. We used to have to enter “something” into the bank’s database when opening a checking account for people. When the person was a alien student on a visa, we had to enter the 999’s and there was another form we took note of. Its a little cloudy, but for that name it would make sense. Again, not proof, just experience.
Vermont Lt said: I think the 999 codes are what are used for foreign students. We used to have to enter “something” into the bank’s database when opening a checking account for people. When the person was a alien student on a visa, we had to enter the 999’s and there was another form we took note of. Its a little cloudy, but for that name it would make sense. Again, not proof, just experience.
I respond: You are correct! It was a common thing, especially back in the early days of data entry, that some data fields were coded numeric, especially when the field NEVER should contain alphabetic characters. In most cases, a person had a number, so to ensure accuracy and completeness of data entry, fields were often also coded as mandatory entry. In the rare instance when a number did not apply (no matter what the number was—account number, SS#, medical record#, limitless examples)—it was common practice to knowingly fill the field with 9s. This allowed exception reports to be printed so auditors could verify that each was a deliberate exclusion (allowed) and not an error.
All 9’s was the common filler when a particular field, for a particular person, needed to be left “blank” but couldn’t be left blank because it was coded numeric, mandatory entry, but there was no valid number to enter. Forcing the data entry operator to fill with 9’s assured that the operator consciously recognized that this person’s data was exceptional. If skipped but not consciously filled with 9s, the field would have filled with zeroes.