Scan More, Print Less - save your small business a small fortune

Transcription

1 Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue Sposored by:

2 About the As the o-profit associatio dedicated to urturig, growig ad supportig the user ad supplier commuities of ECM (Eterprise Cotet Maagemet) ad Social Busiess Systems (or Eterprise 2.0), AIIM is proud to provide this research at o charge. I this way the educatio, the etire commuity ca leverage the thought- leadership ad directio provided by our work. Our objective is to preset the wisdom of the crowds based o our 70,000- strog commuity. We are happy to exted free use of the materials i this report to ed-user compaies ad to idepedet cosultats, but ot to suppliers of ECM systems, products ad services, other tha Fujitsu ad its subsidiaries ad parters. Ay use of this material must carry the attributio AIIM / Fujitsu Rather tha redistribute a copy of this report to your colleagues, we would prefer that you direct them to for a free dowload of their ow. Our ability to deliver such high-quality research is made possible by the fiacial support of our uderwritig sposor, without whom we would have to retur to a paid subscriptio model. For that, we hope you will joi us i thakig our uderwriter for this support: PFU Imagig Solutios Europe Limited Hayes Park Cetral, Hayes Ed Road Hayes Middlesex UB4 8FE, UK Phoe: +44 (0) pr@fel.fujitsu.com Website: PFU Imagig Solutios GmbH Frakfurter Rig Muich, Germay Phoe: +49 (0) pr@fel.fujitsu.com Website: PFU Imagig Solutios S.p.A Via Nazario Sauro, Sesto Sa Giovai (MI), Italy Phoe: +39 (0) pr@fel.fujitsu.com Website: Process Used This report refereces previous AIIM survey fidigs, each of which is refereced withi the documet. About AIIM AIIM has bee a advocate ad supporter of iformatio professioals for early 70 years. The associatio missio is to esure that iformatio professioals uderstad the curret ad future challeges of maagig iformatio assets i a era of social, mobile, cloud ad big data. AIIM builds o a strog heritage of research ad member service. Today, AIIM is a global, o-profit orgaizatio that provides idepedet research, educatio ad certificatio programs to iformatio professioals. AIIM represets the etire iformatio maagemet commuity: practitioers, techology suppliers, itegrators ad cosultats. AIIM rus a series of traiig programs, icludig the Certified Iformatio Professioal (CIP) course. About the author David Joes is a Market Aalyst with the AIIM Market Itelligece Divisio. He has over 15 years experiece of workig with users ad vedors across a wide rage of vertical markets. His experiece has focused o takig complex techologies, such as busiess itelligece ad documet maagemet, ad developig them ito commercial solutios largely i the retail, web ad customer relatioship maagemet (CRM) areas. He has also worked as a cosultat providig accoutig, data miig ad CRM strategy ad implemetatio solutios to blue chip cliets i the UK ad Europe. David has a BSc i Computer Sciece, ad is a qualified CIP, ECM P ad SharePoit P. Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 2012 AIIM Europe The it Cetre, 8 Caalside, Lowesmoor Wharf Worcester, WR1 2RR, UK +44 (0)

3 Table of Cotets About the : About the... 2 Process used... 2 About AIIM... 2 About the author... 2 Itroductio: Itroductio... 4 Small Busiesses... 4 Direct Costs...4 Idirect Costs...5 Retur o Ivestmet (ROI): Retur o Ivestmet (ROI)... 7 Coclusios: Coclusios... 8 Refereces... 8 Uderwritte i part by: Fujitsu... 9 AIIM Sca More, Prit Less: Sca More, Prit Less:... 5 Case Study...5 Idirect Savigs...6 Scaer Requiremets: Scaer Requiremets:... 6 Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 3

4 Itroductio Small busiesses ca save moey by replacig their prit ad copy culture with itelliget documet scaig. From the day you plug i a ew priter or copier it starts costig your busiess moey. Plug i a scaer ad it ca actually save you moey. Scaers cost about the same as a priter, ad today a dedicated scaer costig betwee 150 ad 500 will sca documets at the same speed most priters spit them out double-sided too. Scaig icomig documets allows them to be saved straight to the local PC or etwork, providig easy access ad sharig of the iformatio. This immediately decreases the eed for further copies, speeds up commuicatios, allows documets to be trasmitted worldwide i secods ad reduces additioal costs. Ad the cost is ot oly to your busiess. Thik of how may trees it took to prit your weekly sales figures or take a look i the toer re-cyclig box - you may or may ot be cocered about sustaiability ad Gree IT but i so may ways, scaig ad all-electroic documet processig could be helpig save the plaet ad savig you time ad moey i the process. I this paper, we provide calculatios, based o AIIM s research, detailig how much your existig prit ad copy focused processes are costig you, how to maage the documets you receive i the mail ad the how to deliver documets to your customers ad suppliers. Based o a few simple scearios, we ca show you how ivestig a few hudred Euros i a scaer ca brig payback i just a few moths eve for the smallest of compaies. Small Busiesses 99% of all Europea busiesses are small ad medium eterprises (SMEs), ad betwee them they provide two out of three of all private-sector jobs ad cotribute to more tha half of the total output of all busiesses i Europe. Furthermore 9 out of 10 SMEs are actually micro eterprises with less tha 10 employees. These small busiesses form the backboe of the Europea ecoomy. So why is it, whe it comes to usig techology to assist SMEs, that all we hear about is eterprise-wide solutios? Most small busiesses do t have, wat or eed corporate documet maagemet systems, itra-repository data coectios or complex documet goverace procedures. What they have is the eed to maage their iformatio ad costs i the most efficiet way they ca. Ad oe of the sigificat costs to a SME is that of pritig. Direct Costs Priter/Copier Costs The average Europea employee prits aroud 30 pages per day accordig to 2011 research by Ipsos 2 ad Kyocera 5 with approximately 62% beig uecessary. This of course is despite the fact that more ad more busiess commuicatios are beig doe electroically. AIIM research 1 shows that approximately oe third of ivoices ow arrive as PDF attachmets; however, the survey also foud that most people (77%) are likely to prit off at least oe copy of the electroic documet, with may also makig further copies. Ikjet Moo Laser Colour Laser Cost of Ik/Toer Number of pages per refill Cost Per Page (EUR) Priter/copier costs Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue Paper Costs The actual cost of paper varies massively based o the type used ad teds to be low i compariso to the cost of the ik/toer. However, ay busiess should be able to readily idetify the amout spet per aum o paper ad therefore also idetify the associated cost per employee per year, week ad day. Postage Costs A ofte usee ad expesive side-effect of pritig is that of postage costs. Each letter/ivoice/brochure that is prited ( 0.02 per sheet) will eed to be put ito a evelope ( 0.10), have postage added (at least 0.50) ad be posted. All of these beig performed by a member of staff. Employees Cost per day Cost per week Cost per moth Cost per year 1, , , Prit ad postage costs 4

5 The total costs associated with pritig ad postage are show i the table above based o the followig assumptios: 0.02 per prited/copied documet (moo laser) 30 prited/copied documets per day per employee as a average 1 outboud letter per day per employee Idirect Costs Of course the direct costs of pritig ad copyig have a sigificat fiacial impact o ay busiess, but these are ot the oly issues. Capitalisatio has led to a idustrialized ad eergy-drive society ad a by-product of that is global warmig. It has bee widely reported that trees are a importat tool i the fight to agaist global warmig 3 ; give that busiesses are cosumig large amouts of this paper ad paper comes from trees, ay reductio i the amout of paper cosumed will have a positive effect for the plaet. With the average employee pritig over 6,000 sheets of paper per year we ca see that a 10 perso compay accouts for 5 trees per year (12,500 sheets of paper come from oe tree 4 ). Add to this the reductio i costs ad eergy used durig the recyclig of ik ad toer cartridges, ad ay reductio i the amout of pritig performed must be of both huge fiacial ad social beefit? Sca More, Prit Less We have already metioed that icreasig amouts of documets are beig delivered ito busiesses electroically, but these accout for less tha a third of the total documets arrivig. So what happes to the remaider of these documets? Documets withi a workplace ca be shared, edited, have iformatio take off them ad siged. Each of these actios ca be doe at least as efficietly with a electroic documet, ad areas such as documet sharig are vastly more efficiet with electroic versus paper documets. Case Study Gettig There is a 10 perso producer of travel books ad has just received a order from a large bookstore for 1,000 books. The order has arrived by post to the compay secretary. Curret Procedure Secretary copies the order 4 times: 1 for her records, 1 for the accouts team, 1 for the sales team ad oe for the official archive. The sales team the copy their copy of the order to pass to the shippig team maager ad so o. At least 4 copies of a sigle order are made i this process with a umber of persoal copies beig made purely o the just i case basis. Itroducig a desktop scaer ito this eviromet ca radically chage the process ad save time ad moey. Oce the order has bee accepted a order ackowledgemet eeds to be set to the purchasig compay. This is prited by the accouts team, put i a evelope, has postage added ad the is take to the post-box all of which have time ad cost elemets totallig approximately 1 per item icludig the evelope, postage ad staff time. Additioal documets are prited further dow the process - delivery slips ad shippig iformatio, the ivoice ad paymet slip ad whe the ivoice is paid the whole process repeats with the secretary takig 4 copies ad so o. Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 5

6 New Procedure: With Scaig Secretary scas the order documet usig a desktop scaer. It is scaed as a OCR eabled PDF documet, Origial to archive which meas that the text ad umbers o the documet ca be copied ad pasted direct from the PDF ito other applicatios such as the accouts software. This PDF is saved ito a shared folder o the corporate etwork, or passed ito the compay s documet maagemet system if it has oe. The secretary the s the relevat people i the accouts ad sales teams with a lik to the shared documet. Those teams ca the make use of that shared documet Order i Sca Order Lik to relevat staff Save to etwork folder ad either extract the iformatio from the PDF or lik that documet to other tools such as the Customer Relatioship Maagemet (CRM) tool for the sales team. No copies of the documet are required ad the origial, oce scaed ca be filed or shredded as appropriate. The order ackowledgemet is o loger posted, but created as a PDF ad set as a attachmet to a . Not oly has the compay saved moey o postage, but the purchasig compay has received cofirmatio of their order much faster ad ca pass the electroic documet directly ito their processes. Further dow the process, the Gettig There sales delivery team have received a lik to a electroic copy of the order ad ca satisfy the order. Postage will still be required, uless the book ca be delivered electroically, but the ivoice associated with the delivery ad cofirmatio of the success of the delivery ca all be doe electroically. Ad assumig the ivoice is paid electroically, o more paperwork is required at all durig this process. Idirect Savigs Not oly are we savig o the cost of paper, toer ad postage i the above example, savigs are also beig made i other areas: Distributio time Oce the secretary has copied the order she still has to physically get it to the sales ad accouts teams, who may be i a differet room or buildig. Scaig the order ad ig a lik meas that the other teams ca gai ear-istat access to the order. Storage space Each copy of the order eeds to be stored somewhere leadig to a plethora of filig cabiets i each departmet. The scaed solutio provides oe digital documet that ca be accessed by all, evetually removig the eed for filig cabiets occupyig expesive floor space. Scaer Requiremets Most busiesses already have access to a scaer, typically as part of a multi-fuctio priter (MFP). The facilities offered by existig equipmet will vary, but ay busiess scaer should provide the followig: Optical Character Recogitio (OCR) Oe of the most importat fuctioal aspects of ay scaig solutio is that it performs OCR, which scas the iformatio o a paper documet ad attempts to covert it to readable text ad umbers. This is very differet to low ed scaers that will literally take a picture of the documet ad store it as a image. Sca to PDF PDF is ow the format of choice for may busiesses ad ay scaer eeds to be able to sca directly to this format, ideally with OCR icluded Sca to Applicatio There are times whe you wat to edit the cotet of the documet beig scaed ad havig the ability to sca directly to your word processig or spread sheet applicatio of choice should be a core feature of ay scaig toolset. Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 6

7 Sca to Folder The user should have complete cotrol over where the scaed documet eds up, be it displayed o scree, set to a secodary applicatio such as MS Word or saved to a folder. Coectivity Scaers ca be coected ito the SME i a umber of ways ad the choice will vary from busiess to busiess as to which works best for them. Etheret (ie direct ito the etwork) ad USB are commo coectivity optios. Simple Use It goes without sayig that ay scaig solutio deployed ito a SME eeds to be simple to use: complex cofiguratio ad maiteace are ot a optio for a small busiess. Advaced Techologies A umber of behid the scees scaig techiques are deployed by the better scaers to geerate quality copies of documets. These iclude blak page removal, auto-rotatio of pages ad the detectio of misfeeds (multiple sheets beig passed through the scaer at oce) all of these should be trasparet to the user. Profiles Ideally the scaig solutio should be able to maage differet user or applicatio profiles; whe scaig for accouts you may wish to sca to MS Excel ad save to a particular folder versus scaig to PDF ad savig to a alterative folder for geeral correspodece. Automatic Documet Feeder (ADF) Oe thig that differetiates a dedicated scaer from may MFPs is the iclusio of a ADF. The ADF allows a umber of pages to be loaded ad scaed i oe go, with the associated scaig software capable of scaig at oe scaed documet per page, or collatig ito a sigle scaed documet. Duplex May icomig documets will be prited o both sides ad as such ay scaer eeds to be able to cope with this, ideally idetifyig ad removig blak pages as the documet is processed ad saved. Colour ad DPI Of course, documets should be able to be scaed i colour or moochrome, ad various levels of scaig quality, measured i dots per ich (DPI) eed to be accommodated. Retur o Ivestmet (ROI) As with ay large compay, a SME ivestig i a scaer eeds to see a measurable retur o ivestmet ad the itroductio of a scaer with just a simple chage i process ca lead to sigificat savigs. The diagrams below bechmark the time take to achieve ROI for a variety of busiess sizes ad the savigs made over the first 12 moths. Both diagrams are based o the savigs made purely o pritig costs usig 30 sheets per employee per day at a cost of 0.02 per pritout. As ca be see, the results are staggerig. A 10 perso compay ca achieve a retur o ivestmet after just 4 moths of deploymet ad delivers a additioal 940 savig i 12 moths. Eve a 5 perso compay oly takes 9 moths to break-eve, with additioal savigs of over 200 across 12 moths. Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue How log does it take for a scaer to pay for itself? Year 1 Savigs by Employees 10 staff 4 moths 5 staff 9 moths Savig (EUR) Based o: 1 scaer per office, 0.02 EUR per pritout, 30 pritpouts per perso per day

8 Coclusios Small busiesses are the lifeblood of the Europea ecoomy but are ivolved i a costat battle to wi busiess, survive today s challegig ecoomic climate, ad compete i the global marketplace. As such, ay opportuity to cut costs ad improve efficiecies withi the SME should be explored. U-ecessary pritig ad copyig is rife withi all busiesses, costig a 10 perso compay over 900 per year just i ik/toer costs. Add to that the cost of paper, storage, hadlig ad postage, ad the egative effect of every sigle extra copy of a documet withi the busiess becomes apparet. We have highlighted a simple case-study that demostrates how the use of a sigle desktop scaer ca reduce these costs. The cost reductios do ot come purely by itroducig the scaer: work must be doe to modify the workplace processes to take advatage of the ew equipmet, but these chages are relatively easy to maage i a small team ad pave the way for sigificat cost savigs over a 12 moth period eve for the smallest of small busiesses. Couple this with the fact that a reductio of paper usage equates to a reductio i the umber of trees cut dow ad both the social ad fiacial aspects of the decisio to deploy a scaer become covicig, provided the scaer covers all of the fuctioal aspects required by the busiess. Additioal beefits of scaig iclude decreased storage requiremets for paperwork (therefore less office floorspace to pay for) ad a reductio i the amout to time it takes to share ad locate documets search facilities i MS Widows make fidig a scaed PDF very quick ad easy. All of this leads to the coclusio that the cost of implemetig a simple scaig solutio ca be fully recovered i a small amout of time. I additio the icreased use of electroic documets ca deliver a superior service to cliets (iteral ad exteral) ad help save the plaet so what s stoppig you? Refereces 1. AIIM Idustry Watch The Paper Free Office dream or reality March Paper Waste o the Icrease 3. About.com - Which trees offset global warmig Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 4. Techsoup Paper Shockig Statistics 5. Rethikig Pritig Kyocera File.cpsdowload.tmp/Executive%20Summary%20ad%20Aalysis.pdf 8

9 UNDERWRITTEN BY About PFU PFU Limited (Japa), a Fujitsu compay, is the maker of Fujitsu scaers. PFU offers the broadest portfolio of documet scaers for professioal persoal, desktop, workgroup ad high-volume productio eviromets ad is oe of the world s leadig documet scaer compaies. PFU has bee egaged i the documet imagig scaer busiess for more tha 20 years. Fujitsu scaers are reowed for their excellet imagig ad paper quality ad itegrate seamlessly i all major documet maagemet applicatios. Operatig i Europe, the Middle East, ad Africa (EMEA), PFU Imagig Solutios Europe Limited is resposible for marketig ad sales of the Fujitsu documet scaers. The Europea compay was established i the Uited Kigdom i 1981 ad has subsidiaries i Germay ad Italy. As a subsidiary of Fujitsu, PFU is able to cocetrate o the documet imagig busiess like o other maufacturer, leveragig the huge iovatio power of Fujitsu. Thus PFU ca come up with iovatios that the market wats ad it ca direct its expertise exactly to the eeds of its customers from large corporatios through medium-sized eterprises to freelace professioals. The result is a extremely broad array of scaer models - for productio eviromets with high sca volumes, for desktop ad workgroup use, ad for professioal ed users. PFU is shapig the future of documet maagemet with the ew paradigm of Sca-to-Process. Scaig is chagig face from Sca-to-Archive to Sca-to-Process, from the ed of a work chai to the early itegratio ito busiess processes. Today scaig comes at the begiig of a busiess process markig the etrace ito Documet Maagemet ad Eterprise Cotet Maagemet. PFU scaers support Sca-to-Cloud, which meas that compaies have the opportuity to sca their documets directly ito cloud applicatios like Everote or Dropbox. Thus, they ca sychroize their iformatio at oe sigle locatio, creatig a data pool that all.authorized persos ca access, ayplace, aytime. With Sca-to-Mobile the Fujitsu subsidiary is the first maufacturer to offer seamless trasmissio of paper documets to iphoe / ipad ad Adroid-based devices. Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 9

10 AIIM ( is the global commuity of iformatio professioals. We provide the educatio, research ad certificatio that iformatio professioals eed to maage ad share iformatio assets i a era of mobile, social, cloud ad big data. Fouded i 1943, AIIM builds o a strog heritage of research ad member service. Today, AIIM is a global, o-profit orgaizatio that provides idepedet research, educatio ad certificatio programs to iformatio professioals. AIIM represets the etire iformatio maagemet commuity, with programs ad cotet for practitioers, techology suppliers, itegrators ad cosultats. Sca More, Prit Less - save your small busiess a small fortue 2012 AIIM AIIM Europe 1100 Waye Aveue, Suite 1100 The IT Cetre, Lowesmoor Wharf Silver Sprig, MD Worcester, WR1 2RR, UK (0)