A customer sent their IBAN in Arabic-Indic digits and the bank transfer form won't take it; how do I convert it without copying errors?
Paste the IBAN exactly as you received it into the digit converter and choose Western digits as the target. Every digit keeps its value and position, and the SA prefix and the spaces stay as the customer sent them, so there are no 22 digits to retype by hand.
Why an IBAN deserves extra care
A Saudi IBAN is two letters followed by twenty-two digits. Retyping that many characters from one screen to another invites mistakes: a doubled digit, a zero missing from a ٠٠٠٠ group, two groups swapped. A bank form may reject the wrong number, or accept it if it happens to be well-formed, and the transfer goes somewhere you did not intend.
The reason the form rejects the original is simple: the characters ٠ to ٩ are not the digits the field expects. The value is right, but the characters are not the ones it wants.
The example
An illustrative IBAN as it might arrive in a message:
SA٠٣ ٨٠٠٠ ٠٠٠٠ ٦٠٨٠ ١٠١٦ ٧٥١٩
Converted to Western digits:
SA03 8000 0000 6080 1016 7519
The tool reports 22 digits converted, all from Arabic-Indic, which is exactly the digit count of a Saudi IBAN. If you see a different number, the text you copied is short or has something extra, so go back to the customer's message before any money moves.
The steps
- Copy the IBAN from the customer's message as it is, including the two letters at the start.
- Open the Arabic/Persian/Western digit converter, paste it, and choose 'Western 0123456789'.
- Check the 'Digits converted' count: 22 for a complete Saudi IBAN.
- Copy the result into the bank form. If the form wants the number without spaces, remove them there, or enter it the way your bank asks.
A second check before you send
The conversion itself cannot get a value wrong, because it is a fixed offset: ٧ always becomes 7. Errors come from copying, such as missing part of the number when you select it. For peace of mind, put the original and the result into Text comparison at character level: the only difference you should find is the digit shape, in the same positions.
Remember that the tool does not validate the IBAN itself. It does not compute check digits and cannot know whether the account exists. Some banks show the account holder's name before you confirm, so compare it with your customer's name.
What about Persian digits?
If the customer sent the number from a phone with a Persian keyboard, the digits will be ۰ to ۹, which look almost identical to Arabic-Indic. Keep Persian ticked under the styles to convert and they change in the same pass, with their count shown next to Persian.
Common questions
Is the account number sent to any server?
No. The conversion runs in your browser and nothing is stored.
Do the letters SA change?
No. Letters never change, and neither do the spaces between the groups.
Does this work for a local account number or a card number?
Yes, for any long number. The tool does not know what kind of number it is; it only changes the shape of the digits.