Question for the dealership guys...

[pw_cc_runner]

I am researching VIN scanning products for work. We primarily deal with classics so it needs to go beyond the barcode apps/programs Like VIN Viper etc. My boss claims there is a product out there that scans the stamped/raised number VINs, but I haven't been able to find evidence of that yet. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks!

[blackmage]

We used CDM Data for quite a while with a VIN scanner, but it only scanned the bar codes on the vehicles. (we now use a combination of vAuto and Dealer.com's tools for everything) It is possible that a picture of the vin # itself could be read and input into a program, but it would have to decipher that first. Kind of like when you scan a document, Adobe can turn a scanned document into a digital document, although it never seems to come out right.

I havn't seen any programs that will do that yet, and vAuto will only do barcodes.

[pw_cc_runner]

Thanks for the scoop. I will look into both of those. My co-worker swears the technology it is out there based solely on the existence of police license plate scanners. While that might be true I'd be willing to bet my company isn't will to pay whoever holds that technolgy to develop it into what they want.

[blackmage]

Either that, or it is out on the market and no one wants to pay what theyre asking. I might do a little digging this morn to see if there is anything out there, but I'm with you, I don't think it's in production and able to be used by dealerships.

[Waver]

In the entire time I have been in the dealership world I haven't seen anything like that. If we don't have the bar code, we hand write the vin down until we can get to a computer to decode it. The closest thing that I can think of that does that is the license plate scanner that the Carfox app uses.