Completing your document scanning project represents a significant leap toward a streamlined, digital future for your business. However, what comes next is equally important: ensuring that you’re taking advantage of everything there is to be gained from the process.
From enhancing data security to modernizing the management and accessibility of your records., the post-scanning journey offers numerous exciting opportunities for your business.
In the sections that follow, we will explore several strategies to help you maximize your investment in document scanning. These include securely shredding unnecessary documents and implementing automation where possible. Plus, we’ll offer a few tips to help you and your team adjust to a whole new way of managing information.
Shred Your Original Documents
Now that your documents have been scanned, one of the first things you should consider is the fate of the original paper versions.
While some businesses may wish to retain their physical copies for regulatory or operational reasons, for many others, secure document shredding is an ideal solution for handling these originals post-digitization.
Shredding your documents not only frees you from the burden of storing all that unnecessary paper; it also serves as a proactive measure to help prevent data breaches, safeguarding your business’s compliance with data privacy laws.
With information theft on the rise, simply throwing your documents in the garbage is not an option. Even if you don’t believe your records contain any sensitive information, why take the risk?
Our NAID® AAA certified, HIPAA compliant shredding service presents a safe, always compliant, and environmentally friendly solution to help you get rid of excess paper documents.
Outsourcing the shredding process to an experienced provider like SecureScan ensures compliance with the highest industry standards for document destruction. We issue a certificate of destruction for your records, documenting the process and confirming that a secure chain of custody was maintained from collection to destruction. This shifts the compliance burden from your shoulders to ours, offering your team a hands-off experience and providing peace of mind.
Set up a Document Management System
Whether you’ve decided to shred your original documents or store them, it’s likely that you’re eager to integrate your new digital files into your day-to-day operational requirements.
To do so, you’ll need an interface that allows you and your team to interact with your files. A document management system is software designed to fill that role.
These systems bring order to chaos, simplifying the process of managing a large number of files. They come with features for categorizing, tagging, and searching, allowing you to quickly locate and utilize your files when you need them.
A document management system doesn’t just enhance the utility of your files, it also helps you protect them. These systems allow you to store all of your records in the cloud, ensuring that your files are accessible from any location, regularly backed up for redundancy, and secured with the latest technologies. These additional security measures help you ensure that only individuals with explicit permissions can access records, preventing unauthorized access and protecting against data loss.
Most systems also include some form of version control, allowing you to monitor changes, additions, and deletions in your library and create auditable digital “paper” trails. These audit trails can help you maintain document integrity and simplify legal compliance.
When you choose SecureScan for your document scanning needs, we provide comprehensive support for setting up a new document management system or integrating scanned files into your existing setup. Our extensive experience and meticulous attention to detail streamline this process, ensuring flawless execution.
Leveraging years of industry expertise, we simplify the complexities of document management, enabling you to benefit from a system that is precisely configured to meet your specific requirements.
Train Your Employees
With your digital documents neatly organized and securely stored in a document management system, the next step is ensuring your team can fully utilize them.
Training your employees at this stage is crucial. It empowers them to confidently navigate the new system, maximizing the benefits of your digitization efforts. After all, the effectiveness of the new system hinges on the ability of your team to use it proficiently.
Training should cover the basics of accessing and retrieving documents from the new system, ensuring that all employees are comfortable with these fundamental processes. It’s also important to teach them advanced features relevant to their specific roles, such as editing, sharing protocols, and security practices.
Of course, it’s also crucial for employees to have a thorough understanding of the process for adding new documents as they are generated. This ensures that the organizational system you’ve established will be sustained into the future.
This helps minimize any disruptions to daily operations and to avoid inefficiencies that can arise from a lack of familiarity with new systems. Well-trained employees are more likely to embrace the new technology, which can lead to improved productivity and a smoother transition overall.
Feedback from your employees about your new system during the setup process can be invaluable. As the primary users of the new system in their daily job roles, they possess unique insights that might not have been apparent during the initial setup phase. No one understands your operational needs better than your own team, and incorporating their input can ensure that the system is tailored to meet the specific demands of your business. This feedback loop not only enhances system usability but also encourages employee engagement by making them active participants in the transition process.
Automate Tedious Tasks
The transition to digital documents opens up a whole new world of possibilities for your business, one of the most significant being the opportunity to automate various business processes.
AP (Accounts Payable) automation is a prime example of how automation can transform a critical business function, streamlining workflows and enhancing efficiency.
AP automation, a service offered by SecureScan, revolutionizes the way businesses handle their accounts payable. It reduces the need for manual data entry, minimizes errors, and speeds up the processing of invoices and payments. This not only cuts down on processing time but also translates to cost savings, as the manual effort is significantly reduced.
But the benefits of AP automation extend beyond just time and cost savings. It provides a more seamless, accurate, and transparent process, which is easier for employees to manage. This reduction in manual tasks frees up your team to focus on more important tasks. Employees are no longer bogged down by repetitive, time-consuming tasks, leading to improved job satisfaction and productivity.
Automate Your Mailroom
Another time consuming process that you can automate within your business is the handling of postal mail. With our mailroom automation service, incoming mail is immediately scanned and uploaded it into your document management system, integrating your physical mail into your newly established digital workflow.
By digitizing mail as it arrives, your employees will gain immediate access to relevant pieces mail, eliminating the need for internal routing and distribution. This seamless flow of information throughout your business enhances decision-making across various departments and simplifies the integration of postal mail with your other records.
Mailroom automation also eliminates the need to set aside physical space for a mailroom, reduces the amount of labor required to process mail, and cuts down on the delays associated with physical mail processing, saving you time and money for more important initiatives.
Implement Day Forward Scanning
After implementing digital storage for your existing documents, it’s important to consider how you handle new physical documents generated by your business.
Day forward scanning is an effective strategy for integrating new paper documents into your digital workflow. By scanning documents as they are created, new records can be seamlessly integrated with existing ones, in a manner consistent with the design of your new system.
Day forward scanning will help your business maintain a paperless environment by preventing the accumulation of physical documents in the future, and ensures that new records generated by your business are immediately available in digital format. This crucial step helps your business maintain the efficiency and organization you’ve established with your digitization initiatives.
In many cases, businesses a choose to outsource the scanning process to a professional, recognizing the advantages of taking a hands-off approach to records management. Businesses looking to archive older records who no longer generate much paper may consider handling this process themselves as-needed.
The SecureScan Advantage
With over 21 years of experience, SecureScan has been the leading provider of professional document scanning services for more than two decades.
We provide the essential guidance and support you need to boost your business operations, secure your data, and streamline your recordkeeping, all while avoiding the typical complications of such transitions.
We understand the unique challenges businesses can face when moving from paper record keeping to a digital environment, and will be at your side through every step of the process to ensure that your transition is smooth and secure, while maximizing the long term benefits of such a shift.
For businesses ready to take the next step in their digital transformation or to learn more about our services, we encourage you to contact us for a consultation or to get a free quote. Let us help you unlock the full potential of your digital transformation with SecureScan.
If you haven’t scanned your documents yet, read our companion article which teaches you how to prepare for your document scanning project.
