I just recalled some information that someone smarter than me might be able to figure out: 18 months or so ago, I somehow found the UPC numbers submitted to Amazon for seven of the products I’m talking about. (I can’t remember how – I think Amazon used to list UPC number on the product pages, but it was inconsistent and they don’t seem to do it at all anymore.)
Comparing those numbers to the ones on the original boxes (i.e., the 13-digit British UPC codes), the codes used on Amazon are nearly identical. They are 12 digits (the American standard) instead of 13. My guess is that the seller knows some way to modify the British codes to make them acceptable to Amazon. But I can’t see any pattern in how the new codes were concocted:
In one case, the last digit of the 13 digit code was simply lopped off.
In three cases, the last three digits were replaced by two different digits: 427 became 52, 637 became 75, and 198 became 20
In the remaining three cases, the last two digits were replaced by one different digit: 67 to 3, 44 to 8, 48 to 2.
My first guess was that the new digits were arbitrary as long as the new code was 12 digits. But when I tried it myself it didn’t work.
That’s all I know!
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