Unique Coded Number (UCN)
A Unique Coded Number, or UCN, is an Image Survivable Feature (ISF) consisting of an encrypted code number printed on the face of the cheque.
Parseq has worked in close collaboration with technology partners such as DIA Europe, whose KAPPA Fraud Prevention platform validates cheques passing through the central image clearing system (ICS). This close partnership has resulted in the development of an automated cheque verification tool, based on a UCN (Unique Code Number), designed to minimise fraudulent activity, in particular the counterfeiting of cheques.
A UCN provides the bank and its cheque-issuing corporate customers with a robust and comprehensive cheque fraud prevention platform which fully survives the imaging process of the ICS. The UCN is currently being applied to some banks’ personal cheques and can also be applied to Corporate ‘Special’ Book and Computer Cheques in the same way. Counterfeit and fraudulently altered items can then be readily identified by comparing th data included in the UCN against what is visible on the cheque itself..
Our UCN encrypts the individual Cheque Number, Sort Code and Account Number into a simple alphanumeric string, a unique coded number, using a secure encryption algorithm which is printed onto the cheque in two designated positions. The UCN is always printed in two locations to ensure capture even if a receipt stamp has been used, or it is otherwise obscured.
