MICR Full Form Name
Full Form of MICR :
Magnetic Ink Character Recognition
MICR Full Form is Magnetic
Ink Character Recognition. MICR is basically a
character-recognition technology which is widely used by banks to simplify the
processing of cheques. Bank chequebooks have certain characters and numbers
which seem very irrelevant. But these are deliberately printed with magnetic
ink or MICR. It is a system that applies special characters printed with
special ink. These characters are unrecognizable and can be read only when
passed through a machine specially designed for it. The machine magnetizes the
magnetic ink and translates the same into characters.
An MICR code may contain
information like the serial number of the cheque, the account number of the
cheque depositor, branch code of the bank and the transaction code. The very
purpose of MICR is to provide high-speed scanning and secure information
processing. MICR font is normally used for printing deposit slips, checks,
mortgage coupons etc. There are computers that are equipped with appropriate
software and hardware to read or print MICR fonts. The MICR line, which is
essentially the MICR encoding, is at the bottom of vouchers and cheques and
usually includes bank code, cheque number, control indicator, bank account
number, bank code, the document type indicator, etc.
This technology facilitates MICR
readers features such as scanning and reading the information into
data-collection device. MICR, unlike a barcode, has one distinguishing feature
and that is that humans can easily these characters. The MICR E-13B font is now
an International standard in the ISO 1004:1995 though the CMC-7 font is
extensively used in Brazil, Mexico, and Europe. Let us take a look at some
historical facts behind the MICR. In the year 1958, the MICR standard was
adopted by the American Bank Association (abbreviated as ABA) for negotiable
instruments such as cheques in the United States of America. By the end of the
year 1959, the cheques using the MICR font were printed. The purpose behind
adopting MICR was accuracy with which the machines read the font.
Eventually, the MICR technology
began to be adopted in different countries such as Australia, the United
Kingdom, and Canada. The CMC-7 font, which was developed by the French group
Groupe Bull in the year 1957 was adopted as the official MICR standard in the
countries France, Argentina, Italy, and other countries in Europe. By the year
1960, the MICR font has taken the shape of a symbol, representing futurism or
modernity and this has resulted in the emergence of lookalike typefaces. MICR
is also used in credit cards, airline tickets, deposit tickets, insurance
premium cards, etc. Thus, MICR has greater utility than one may have thought.