|
||
The reason could be that scanning is the primary step in transferring paper-based information into the electronic content repositories of modern organizations. Under today's Enterprise Content Management systems, electronic content is the lifeblood that drives business operations.
How Does Scanning Transfer Info Into Electronic Workflow?
Scanning alone cannot put paper-based information into the electronic workflow. What scanning does is to create a digital image of a paper document. This image can be a "pure" image like the image of a photograph; or it can be the image of a text document.
While the images of text documents can be read by humans, they are just images to computers. Computers capture images in a bitmap format while text is based on ASCII, Unicode, and other character standards. The two formats are very different. Images of a page can take up to 50 times the space required for an ASCII text page.
To make the text machine-readable, further processing is required. Such processing involves using character recognition technologies like OCR and ICR. With these technologies, the images can be converted into true text documents that can be indexed.
Indexing is the step that makes the document an integral part of the electronic content. Indexing involves categorizing the document based on the full text or meta information attached to the document. Indexed documents can be retrieved through searching by the words in the text or meta keywords.
Why Transfer to 'Electronic Workflow'?
What is the significance of transferring paper-based documents into the electronic workflow? The answer is that the benefits are many.
Firstly, electronic content can be retrieved in a few seconds with a few keystrokes at your computer workstation. Retrieval of paper documents would involve going to the file room, identifying the particular filing cabinet, retrieving the right folder, locating the particular document, taking it back to the workstation, and then putting it back into the folder/filing cabinet/file room.
Considering all the hassle of retrieving paper documents, people might just avoid it while making quick decisions. The result would be low-quality decision making. Decisions would be hunch-based instead of informed.
Next comes the distributed accessibility of the content, particularly relevant in the case of global enterprises. Electronic content can be accessed from anywhere in the world with an Internet connection.
Security and safety are also improved when electronic content is used. It is easier to control access to electronic info using access rights and password-based access. Electronic content is also less prone to damage from humidity and disasters such as fires and floods (backups can be stored in a different location without too much hassle).
Cost is another factor favoring electronic content. With electronic copies available, much of the original paper documents can be shredded once they are scanned. This saves on filing cabinets and expensive file-room space.
Conclusion
With the innumerable advantages of moving paper-based content into an electronic workflow, modern enterprises have universally adopted this strategy. The primary step for such paper-to-electronic information movement is scanning. Document imaging and scanning have now come to mean almost the same thing these days.
Whether you employ a number of employees that spend the days working hours retrieving and filing documents or you spend a certain sum of money each month just to put old records in a warehouse, you must take into consideration how a document imaging system can help you.
The correct document tracking system will permit your workers to access important records wherever may be in the office. By simply making data and records available to a number of employees to view at one same time in fact is an important improvement over your paper files.
Furthermore, multi-layered file access permits employees to view then only change the documents that they are allowed to handle.
Consider these facts
90 percent of corporate files exist only on paper.
In a regular office, all pages that are handled everyday, 90 percent of them are simply shuffled.
The average office record is reproduced about 19 times.
Companies spend an average of 20 dollars in labor just for a document to be filed 120 dollars in labor just to locate a misfiled document and about 220 dollars in labor just to reproduce lost documents.
7. 5 percent of documents in the office get lost and 3 percent gets misfiled.
The average employee spends 5 to 15 percent of their valuable time analyzing information, however spends 50 percent looking for these data.
In the United States, there are approximately 4 trillion documents in paper and growing each year at a fast rate of 22 percent.
Document imaging solution means converting paper records to electronic images with the use of primarily a computer and scanner. Once these records are transformed to electronic images they are then stored as data files that are viewed in seconds effortlessly from any of your business computer.
A complete and reliable document imaging solution has the capability to index, capture, recall, search, view, then print documents.
Not like most computer applications that are only capable of storing information that are entered as binary data and configured in the applications special format, a document imaging solution can efficiently store as well as retrieve any kind of scanned record or file no matter how your document was created, be it typed, hand-written or printed.
A document imaging solution can store information from pictures, business letters and cards, forms and even huge drawings and maps.
Selecting a document imaging solution for you
Remember that you should base your choice depending on the needs of your business and not technology. This is because if you primarily focus on the document imaging solutions technology, you can end up having a complicated solution that can not be used by your employees because it offers too much and does not suit your companys processes.
So to make a complete comparison, it is sensible to obtain live demonstrations. This can either be on line or face to face, a live demonstration will permit the vendor to demonstrate to you the strong aspects as well as the features of their document imaging solution while allowing you also to ask important questions.
1. Is it user-friendly? The most significant area to consider is the systems ease of usage. An excellent document imaging solution is one that can be easily configured and installed out-of-the-box that can run immediately with minimal training and customization.
If creating, finding and filling documents is not intuitive and simple, no matter how intelligent is the system, it will never be beneficial if your employees can use it due to complexity and will just result in decrease ROI.
2. Support. Generally, first hand support should be supplied by your systems retailer and not its manufacturer.
Support options will vary. Some retailers will allocate you a certain number of time that you can bank against calls in the future; some charges monthly support fee that consist of an limitless number of help calls and some just charge on a per call basis.
Because document imaging solutions can be complex and because each installation is not the same, it can be sensible to decide on a service agreement that includes limitless upgrades and support particularly on your first year; after that, you can determine how much support you really require.
3. Customizability. Choose a document imaging solution that is customizable so to complement the way your business work.
4. Architecture. Today, many companies choose intelligent document imaging solution that can store data in their own original formats as well as running on various hardware.
5. Scalability. Your document imaging solution must be competent of growing with your needs, as your files increase and as your users increase.
6. Security. Choose a system with more granular security options, such as security rules can be applied to the whole system, or per cabinet, folder, document or just to specific portions of a document.
7. Searching. Find out if you can easily locate documents. Can you call up related docs easily for instance all W2s or docs with specific customer number?
8. Workflow. Your system should have automotive approval processes ability as well as document routing.
Take note that a good document imaging solution will be your foundation or groundwork for future processing forms as well as workflow functions. Document imaging solution has numerous uses in almost all businesses, big or small. You can benefit from it.