• 06/07/2026
  • 7 minutes to read

Understanding identification templates

For illustrative purposes, the following explanation of identification templates focuses on purchase documents and vendors, although the processes described below also apply to other types of business documents and document sources.

Identification templates are used for identifying the source of imported documents, in this case the vendor. When an identification template identifies a VAT registration number for an incoming purchase document, Continia Document Capture searches through the vendor table for a vendor with a corresponding VAT registration number and, if successful, then applies the identified vendor and its associated default template to the document.

Note

The use of identification templates is one of three steps when identifying the source of a document. For more information, see Finding the document source and template.

The underlying logic

Each document category in Document Capture has one identification template. When you import a document into Document Capture, the identification template attempts to link a matching record in the source table to this document. For the PURCHASE document category, it does so by capturing the document's VAT number and searching through the vendor table for a vendor with a matching VAT number.

The identification template consists of a single field, VAT Registration No., which uses multiple different captions and rules to identify the correct VAT registration number of each incoming document. The captions and the rules can both be customized, as described below under To modify search captions and To modify search rules, and together they form the basis of the identification process: When the identification template recognizes a caption in an imported document based on your selection of captions, it searches for a corresponding value to capture to the right of or below that caption. If it finds one, it validates that value against the selected rules to ensure that the value's format is correct – in other words, it confirms that the captured value is indeed a VAT number.

When a VAT number has been captured, Document Capture runs the codeunit CDC Purch Doc. - Identificat. to identify a vendor with a matching VAT number in the vendor table. You can view the codeunit on the identification template card, on the Codeunits FastTab, under After Capture.

Tip

To see the list of templates associated with a vendor, use the Document Templates action from the list of vendors or the Vendor card. To reveal this action, which is hidden by default:

  1. Search (Search) for and select Vendors.
  2. On the list of vendors, click Settings (Settings) > Personalize in the top-right corner.
  3. On the action bar, expand the action group Related.
  4. Hover the cursor over Vendors > Document Templates, then click Show to make the action available.

To modify search captions

You can determine what captions Document Capture should search for when identifying VAT registration numbers in incoming documents. To do this:

  1. Search (Search) for and select Document Categories.
  2. Open the relevant document category. For example, to open the purchase document category, select the PURCHASE line (not the PURCHASE code itself) and click Edit on the action bar.
  3. On the Templates FastTab, in the list of templates, locate the PURCHASE-ID template. Click the Vertical-dots icon, then click Edit to open the template card.
  4. On the Fields FastTab, in the Field Name column, click VAT Registration No. to open the template field card.
  5. On the action bar, click Captions to open the Field Captions page.
  6. Using the New and Delete buttons on the action bar, edit the list of captions as needed.
  7. When you're done, click Close.

Document Capture searches every single incoming document for the captions included in this list to identify each document's VAT registration number, which can be used to identify the document source.

Note

The caption length in the identification template defines the order in which the field captions are used, from the longest to the shortest caption. When adding a field caption to the ID template, the caption length is calculated and stored in the table for that specific caption.

To modify search rules

You can determine the rules to be used by Document Capture when identifying VAT registration numbers in incoming documents. To do this:

  1. Search (Search) for and select Document Categories.
  2. Open the relevant document category. For example, to open the purchase document category, select the PURCHASE line (not the PURCHASE code itself) and click Edit on the action bar.
  3. On the Templates FastTab, in the list of templates, locate the PURCHASE-ID template. Click the Vertical-dots icon, then click Edit to open the template card.
  4. On the Fields FastTab, in the Field Name column, click VAT Registration No. to open the template field card.
  5. On the action bar, click Rules to open the Field Rules page.
  6. Using the New and Delete buttons on the action bar, edit the list of rules as needed.
  7. When you're done, click Close.

Document Capture searches every single incoming document using the rules included in this list to identify each document's VAT registration number. When at least one rule matches the format of a captured value, that value is accepted as a valid VAT number. This VAT number can then be used by Document Capture to identify the document source.