Digitization Of Docs: A Business Investment Decision With A Future

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To digitize or to not digitize? This is the query. Probably, since earlier, many organizations have been asking themselves the exact same question without finding a correct answer; and this is precisely the time-pass that is functioning opposite to them. Obviously, within this long time period of hesitation, the stack of files carries on to expand. Jorge Lopez, Vice President and recognized analyst of the Gartner Group, tried to answer the query in the CIO & IT Executive Summit 2013, which happened in September 2013, in Mexico City. He pointed out that “the tip for getting an effective position in the industry through scientific knowledge will be to be mindful of the reality that digitization is not just something short-lived, but a movement that is modifying the future”.

Out of this unique viewpoint, the living cycle of the record is changed. Today, the document phases include: production, capturing, storing, management and dispersal. Similarly, the complications, better called advantages that the business is dealing with when applying digitization processes will be summarized as detailed below: cost reduction, production and security increase, and green technologies.

In a company, cost reduction is completely relating to the digitization of their business documents. To highlight this announcement, we may take as a reference the “Study about document digitization and the cost of paper conservation”, carried out by the European Union, Andersen Consulting and Gartner Group. This particular report signifies that storing a record in a standard paper file costs 6.53 Euros; and a company will be economizing near 10.53 Euros for each document that is not physically recorded. Moreover, the normal charge for the area required to store old-fashioned files is for 11,000 Euros, against 114 Euros in case documents are stored electronically.

Conversely, the increase in efficiency levels is pointed out in a survey undertaken by AIIM Europe 2009 (the Global Community of Information Professionals), whereby they explain that greater than 15% of any office’s room or space is fated to paper file cabinetry. This space and rather chaotic file organization systems are often the reasons why it takes an average of fifty minutes each day for an employee to search for and locate paper docs. The details demonstrated by these statistics might definitely create a terrible corporate image, decrease in credibility, and even incorrect business decisions.

Concerning safety, this is commonly not better to scan all the docs. Each and every organization should determine that which are the most prominent business docs and these must be scanned. Typically these are the newest, active, oldest and harmed files.

With many document management systems, several staff members may approach a digitized document together, but only authorised individuals can view a digitized file. Quite simply, security is assured, because of specific admittance permissions and merely because document contents could be sent in total or partially, by e-mail or any other electronic mechanism, with out the necessity of sending actual physical copies or required to wait for the files to be attained.

An office that will save paper is actually a green office that values the natural environment. As per a survey conducted by Telefónica, one of the largest private telecom businesses on this planet, a member of staff utilizes the average of 10,000 sheets of paper every year. If this figure is multiplied by the number of personnel in a company, the outcome will be stunning.

The Legal Gap

One of many aspects is limiting extensive use of electronic documents is truly the legal gap round the process. As an example, in the European Union there is modest clear legislation in relation to the legal credibility of electronic documents, though large efforts have been made during the last decade. Do you realize why it is so tricky to implement proper legislation about electronic documentation in The European Union? Mainly because every EU member country needs to translate the corresponding European directive towards a countrywide law; and most recent directives are clear about the purpose and not so about the techniques to get to this purpose.

In addition, there exists a lack of homogenization amongst the different countries of EU. As an example, in Belgium, Spain, France and Holland, there is no distinct legislation about the wreckage of basic physical documents, whilst in Germany and Italy there are certain rules regulating this concern. A definite predicament is that of the United Kingdom, where companies are destroying their original paper docs because of ambiguity of British law. They’ve no specific law controlling the concept.

As may be believed, the safekeeping duration of original papers’ documents isn’t regulated in any general way either, and each and every country specifies the corresponding authority that must determine document safe-keeping periods. Being a fascinated fact, in Switzerland, as an example, documents related with real-estate need to be retained around 20 and 25 year time.

The legal gap is strong proof of insufficient legislative homogeneity, both at an international and national scale. After all, it’s not sensible that, somewhere, the law regulates electronic digitization and filing, and on the contrary, destruction of original files is not granted. This scenario is neither fruitful nor long-lasting. The corresponding officers should act now for the matter and evolve alongside technology, in order to ensure effective electronic business connection among markets and individuals.

Documentary Solutions for Every Taste and Budget

There isn’t any way out that is working for each one. There are various document systems that include digitization, storage, retrieval and handling of business docs as a comprehensive section of the solution and there are several other systems focusing on document digitization. Specific applications may be the ideal option for businesses that want to digitize large sizes of docs, but that do not need a complex document management system. On the contrary, in case a company wishes to merge a document management system in its document creation and generation processes and, because of this, would need more command then modular or all-inclusive document management solutions are the best option.

While earlier, comprehensive solutions were overpriced, presently, numerous document management software vendors have lowered their rates, because document management is ever more common and so as to offer the many advantages of document management – primarily only within access of major companies – to medium and small businesses.

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Source by Andre Wolfgang Klein