Bates Labeling

What is Bates numbering or Bates labeling?

Bates numbers are unique numbers or unique identifiers assigned during document scanning. These are required for all documents used in US litigation. Historically, the process was done with a "Bates" brand stamper, and these numbers are still usually called Bates numbers within the US.

Bates numbers are used to access the scanned document images from document management systems. DCS can provide document scanning services that comply with the requirements for US litigation. Contact us for more details.

Why use the Bates Labeling system?

The Bates numbering system helps litigators organize, track, and recall scanned documents in a case, page by page.

The Bates identifiers often have an alphabetic prefix that represents some information such as the scanned document source. The last part of the Bates identifier is a constant number of digits enabling the scanned pages to be sequentially numbered, at least within a prefixed set. Extra pages can then be inserted into the Bates numbering system by using a suffix.

Implementing Bates numbering scanning

Bates numbers or unique IDs are assigned during the document scanning process. These IDs (Bates labels) become part of the index to the document image files for each page. Contact DCS for full details of implementing Bates label scanning system that will comply with US litigation requirements.

How Bates numbering scanning differs from ordinary document scanning

While scanning large volumes of paper documents and uniquely identifying them is a simple task, adding the bates numbers in electronic format is more complicated, mainly because of the need to ensure the same document has a sequential number.

Our Legal business page explains how Bates label scanning can save time and costs for businesses requiring copies of documents for legal work.