title: What data type could I use for an ID number that has a length of 13 digits in SQL Server 2008?
body: <p>Normally, the INTEGER data type would suffice, but being in South Africa the ID numbers have a length of 13 and the INTEGER data type only goes up to 10. I am not fond of using characters like VARCHAR since it would not restrict the input ID number to integer values only. I only solution I see (other to using VARCHAR) is to use DECIMAL. Only problems that I see are that I can't restrict the max size like in VARCHAR and the data input could have ',' and '.' Any comments?</p>