GS1-128

One barcode can carry more than a product number: the batch, the expiry date, the quantity, the pallet number, all read in a single scan, as long as each piece of data is labelled with a short numeric tag so the scanner knows what it is looking at. A barcode built to that agreed format is called a GS1-128.

The tags are called application identifiers, and the line of text under the barcode shows them in brackets: for example (01) for the product number, (10) for the lot, (15) or (17) for a best-before or expiry date, (21) for a serial number and (00) for a pallet or carton number (the SSCC). A scanner and a system that understand them record all of it without anyone typing.

You will meet it on cartons and pallets rather than on the product in the shop, where a plain EAN barcode is enough. If your customers ask for lot and expiry data on every carton, this is the format they usually mean.