Hi there,

I recently started a new extra job for summer in a hotel, at the reception desk. One of my tasks overnight is entering the details of all the new people that arrived that day into a database, their name.. passport number.. issue date... address etc. We use an application that gets the data from scanning the passports, ID cards etc, mostly by recognizing the data in the lower area of the card, those characters like >>>NAME>>789789>879789 etc.

Passports and ID cards all have it... wait... except Italian ID cards !
We get a lot of italian customers and they only bring their ID card.

So what's the problem with italians? See this picture, this is a 2003 issued italian ID card (2007 ones are just the same). A lame piece of paper with the picture stamped on and typed in with those old typing machines. I don't know if this is the current ID card for italy, but so far all the italians that came to the hotel since May (maybe ~500) had this (they didn't bring a passport, just that ID card).

It doesn't have any of the data for automatic scanning etc, unlike the rest of the world, so I have to type in all the details by hand. That takes around 5 times longer than it does by scan. So I wonder, how can a western european country still use such crap..
Being the way I am, trying to automate all I can and use the available technology to the best extent, it pisses me beyond belief that italians still use that crap.

(Note, I don't hate italians or anything, and this post doesn't mean any hatred towards them, it's just a fact about their ID cards!)