Many businesses still rely on paper files, including doctors’ offices, accounting firms, law practices, and others. However, if your company uses hardcopy files, you may already be aware of some of the pitfalls associated with paper. It is easy to misplace a critical document or for a piece of paper to become misfiled. This confusion can lead to delays. Another downfall is that only one person can work on a paper file at a time, reducing efficiency and slowing down business processes. Finally, paper files can be costly. The cost of printing, time spent filing, and maintaining space to store filing cabinets adds up. Going digital and becoming a paperless office—or a paper-lite office—with the help of document management makes a lot of sense for businesses of all sizes. If your business is drowning in paper and looking for a digital solution, here are a few things to consider regarding document management services.
Document Management: What Is It?
Document management relies on a document management system, or DMS, to help a business store and file incoming documents digitally or electronically. Simply put, document management is the digital storage of your paper files to better manage, retrieve, share, and collaborate on business documents. Setting up a document management system may appear to be cumbersome and time-consuming at first. This is because each and every paper file you have needs to be scanned and stored in the system. However, a trusted partner can help simplify this process and digitize your files efficiently. Once that is accomplished, maintaining your document management system is relatively straightforward. As a new document comes in, it gets scanned and stored into the system according to agreed-upon naming conventions to make it easy to find in the future. Most businesses find that the process is significantly faster and more efficient than filing these papers in a traditional paper file cabinet.
If you plan to move your office to paperless, it is extremely important that you work with a company that can help you select the right document management system for your company’s needs. Each DMS has various features and benefits. Taking the time to choose the right system for your industry, needs, and budget helps ensure that your system is best suited for your needs and is a great fit to boost efficiency and streamline workflows. A trusted partner will go over the various features that different document management systems offer and help you select and implement the right one.
What Do You Gain from Going Paperless?
Before you make any changes to your business, you likely are weighing the pros and cons first. You want to ensure that the changes you are making will be beneficial to your business. As such, you may be asking what you have to gain from going paperless. There are many benefits and various ways that going paperless can benefit your business.
One of the ways that you can realize significant gains by going paperless is by never having to worry about a missing document again. Your staff will not have to hunt down a missing file, as all of your business documents are conveniently stored and retrievable with a DMS, making it easy to sort and find the file you need. Going paperless can also help your business save money. Paper files can be costly. In addition to consumables, paper files require the use of space in your office building or off-site storage, and, odds are, you can think of something better to do with that space. Finally, paperless files allow your employees to work remotely. As more businesses embrace working from home, a document management solution is more critical now than ever. With digital documents, your team can work on a file no matter their location, opening up opportunities for you to hire the best talent regardless of location and reducing overhead costs. There’s no need for paper files when you go digital, as your employees can easily access exactly what they need from anywhere in the world.
Benefits Abound with Document Management
There are several benefits of document management to consider. Going paperless makes sense for most businesses. And even if your business is not as concerned with going paperless, you still may realize the perks of a document management solution.
One of the benefits associated with document management is that it is a time saver for your employees. If a customer or client calls and has a question, an employee may have to pull the paper file, read through documents to find the answer, run to the copy machine, make a copy, and then mail the information off to the client. Electronic files are much easier to work with. When the call comes in, your employee can pull up the file electronically, review it immediately with your customer, and then email a copy of what the client needs directly to them. This is a huge time saver and increases customer satisfaction.
Another benefit is that you do not have to worry about losing any of your business documents. If your office experiences a disaster, such as a fire or a flood, your paper files may be lost forever. This can be catastrophic to a business, with 40 percent of SMBs closing permanently after such an event. But a document management solution can mitigate this vulnerability. With a DMS, all of the information that your business uses is safely stored in the Cloud, ensuring business continuity and providing peace of mind.
If your Green Bay, Fox Cities, Lakeshore, or Greater Milwaukee business is interested in learning more about a document management solution, contact Wisconsin Document Imaging today!