On Fri, 16 Jul 2010 18:30:38 +0100, bart.c wrote: >> It always makes me laugh when I receive an invoice from some company, >> and the account number or invoice number is (e.g.) 1000000023456789. >> Who do they think they're fooling? > > I used to do that. Giving someone an invoice number, or product serial > number, 000001 doesn't exactly give the impression of a thriving > business.
Sure, and there's nothing wrong with (say) 1000234 as your starting figure. I know people who put the year as the starting four digits: 201012345, say. But when you're a one-man company, is anyone going to think that you've genuinely put out 1000000000023456789 invoices to date? Even if you're a giant multinational corporation, such a number is just ridiculous, and it is user-hostile, especially when dealing with the robot interface to their help-desk or paying bills by phone. "Enter your invoice number followed by the hash-key." 1 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 0 *beep* 2 *beep* 3 *beep* 4 *beep* 5 *beep* 6 *beep* ... 7 *beep* 8 * beep* 9 *beep* # *beep* "Sorry, that invoice number is incorrect. Please try again." -- Steven -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
