Document coverage

How many document types from how many countries a vendor can actually read.

If a service supports a passport from one country but not the driver's license from another, a customer holding the second document cannot get through.

The breadth of supported issuing authorities, document versions, and templates in a verification library. An issuing authority is the government body that issues a document, and a template is the reference design for a specific document type and version.

Coverage has several dimensions:

• Countries and issuers, such as national agencies, states, and provinces.
• Document types, such as passports, driver's licenses, national ID cards, and residence permits.
• Versions, since issuers redesign documents over time and older versions stay in circulation.
• Depth of support, which ranges from simply reading a document to fully verifying its security features.

Coverage claims need careful reading:

1. Ask which documents the system can read and which it can fully verify.
2. Ask how it handles new and old versions.
3. Ask how quickly the vendor adds new documents.

Document coverage sits next to terms that are easy to mix up:

• Document verification is the check that depends on coverage.
• Manual review is where unsupported or unclear documents often end up.
• Government-issued ID is the kind of document that coverage describes.