5 Most Common Back-Office Scanning Projects

At Kefron, we understand how hard it is to manage business-critical documents. For over 30 years, we have securely stored and managed documents for over 1,000 businesses. And in that time, we have worked on a range of scanning projects, both large and small. You could say business information is in our DNA.

There are many reasons businesses choose to start a scanning project:

1. Limited physical and digital storage space,
2. Siloed data,
3. Convoluted / legacy folder naming conventions,
4. Time wasted searching for documents,
5. Data preservation at scale.

Whether you need a basic scanned image, or a more advanced searchable file, the opportunity to securely preserve your business intelligence gives both peace of mind and time back to your team. Let’s look at the most common back-office scanning projects here at Kefron:

1. HR Files

HR records must be retained for 3 to 7 years. Maintaining these files is vital to ensure compliance with fair employment practices and best practice are in place. They allow HR to track performance to make more informed decisions on promotions and raises. To lose these, or records of training, would be detrimental to your business and employees. Gathering this information again would be time consuming and costly, and could damage employee relations.

HR files contain other information that your business cannot afford to lose. This includes employee information, timesheets, payment information, goals, performance, and mediation details. Managing this information virtually means if disaster strikes at your place of business, your HR files are safe. This allows you to focus on getting your workspace back up and running. You have peace of mind knowing you won’t have to source this information from scratch.

2. Finance Documents

Finance records such as annual accounts, invoices, and import/export documents are retained for at least 6 years. These must be kept for audits and tax obligations but can also be used to help your company. Your business can gain a better understanding of your financial standing and cashflow. This, in turn, allows you to better predict future cashflow and budgets.

Scanning financial documents allows you to have this information to hand. Many people scan with Optical Character Recognition (OCR), making them text searchable. In a rush, your team can source information without delay. Can’t remember an invoice number? No problem, with OCR you can search by date, author, account, or keyword. An audit trail is automatically kept so passing audits is a breeze.

3. Client/Customer Information

You can improve customer care by making it easier for your team to access customer data. Personal information falls under GDPR and so must be handled with care. To delete this information at the wrong time, or keep it beyond when it’s needed, will have consequences for your business. Not all client information should be kept for the same amount of time. It is dependent on your industry; details can be found on gov.uk. Being aware of retention dates and consent around client data is essential. Using customer information without their explicit consent is a serious offense. For example, Meta was issued a €405 million GDPR fine in 2022 for mishandling data.

To avoid such issues, businesses are digitising their customer information. You can set user permissions on electronic systems so only those who should view this information can. Retention times can be set, as well as reminders so you can be assured you are compliant. A paper trail is kept so you know what the client consented to, and who is handling the information.

4. Legacy Scanning

More and more people are scanning legacy documents, both personal and professional. Text or pictures, one wants to keep in the long-term, are best protected when made electronic. Paper is fragile and easy to tear or stain. Over time the quality of the text or image deteriorates. By the time you notice it’s too late to preserve it, it can’t be restored. The more the hardcopy is handled the more damaged and delicate it will become. Digitised documents do not decay, nor can they be destroyed by accident. Should you delete it, it can be retrieved again but once physical paper is destroyed, it’s gone.

Scanning bureaus have procedures, policies, and protective equipment (such as gloves) to best protect the hardcopy during scanning. Each bureau will have scanning technicians with experience handling delicate and/or damaged materials. The specialised equipment along with protective measures in place means that you’re getting the best possible quality scan. Your precious legacy documents are safe and easily retrievable/shareable when digital.

5. Mailroom

Remote working benefits many companies, though it brought an unexpected problem – mail. With people visiting the office less and less, managing mail has gotten increasingly difficult. Employees may be forced to travel to the office just for a piece of paper. Scanning and managing mail onsite is an option. However, it’s one that is time-consuming and monotonous. Getting a high-level quality scan is difficult if you don’t have experience. It would increase your selected employees’ workload and the tedium would damage motivation. It has been found that when bored, people “become distracted, stressed, or disillusioned. Staff who are bored also are less likely to engage with or focus on their work.” More important and engaging work of theirs and productivity would suffer for the sake of some mail. Outsourcing to a scanning bureau is a convenient and cost-effective solution.

For example, Kefron provides a service. With this service, your post would go directly to Kefron or to a PO box then be redirected to Kefron. Our scanning technicians will scan, upload, and securely transfer each piece to you. They will also be routed to the relevant department/individual. Hardcopies can be destroyed or stored as part of this service. This simplifies compliance, security, and traceability for your organisation. No one will be able to open your mail without authorisation this way. Kefron’s secure SFTP and encryption ensures that the softcopies will be sent directly to the pre-approved parties. A full audit trail is maintained so you can remotely track and manage your mail from wherever you are so long as you have internet access.

So, Where to Go from Here?

The specific needs of your organisation will determine which are most relevant. However, many of the above are relevant for businesses across the board. Unsure of how to start such a project? The best place to go from here is to check out Kefron for more details and customer stories, or speak directly to one of our experts.