The article below comes from the Blog of a
firm called Digital Time Capture. Digital Time Capture offers Timesheet Management Software to construction companies. Here’s what Digital Time Capture says about
its software: “No longer do you need to
use separate timesheet and payroll software solutions for construction payroll.
DTC's easy to use interface allows construction companies to capture payroll
data while automating payroll calculations and seamlessly integrating the data
with any payroll system.”
Personally, I think articles like this one
should say here’s “how to USE LESS paper” rather
than say here’s “how to GO PAPERLESS”.
From a
Reprographer’s perspective, the term “Go Paperless” is an anathema.
One bullet
point that appears to be missing is “adopting the electronic take-off process”
(such as the process promoted by PlanSwift, the company now owned by Textura.) Also, why bother to scan hard-copy plans when
digital files of those documents are likely available directly from the A&E
firms who created those documents?
“Going Paperless
in the Construction Industry”
Thursday, June
20, 2013
Being able to
access your documents from any location may have you thinking that your
construction company would benefit from going paperless. Though it may not be
practical for the industrial construction industry to do this completely, read
the suggestions below for tips on ways you can cut down on the amount of paper
being stored at the office.
Sort
You must first
sort through your files into piles, ones for recycling, shredding and scanning
before you can begin reducing the amount of paper.
Recycle
This is a no
brainer. If you have ever heard of the show Hoarders
(http://www.aetv.com/hoarders/) you have probably considered that there are
mounds of paper at your office that you have forgotten about and do not need.
It takes a little work but it is simple, recycle any paper documents that are
no longer relevant to your company. You may be surprised what you find once you
begin looking. After you have scanned other important documents (see below)
recycle these copies as well.
Scan
By scanning
documents, you are creating an electronic copy that can be stored in the cloud,
your company’s network, whatever works best for your company. Storing the
documents on the cloud will make your company information more secure, away
from any disaster that might happen to your office location. As mentioned,
keeping the paper copy will no longer be necessary and it can be recycled. This
will not only save you space but help keep your documents from getting lost.
Reduce incoming
paper
Once you have
sorted, recycled, and scanned your company’s paper you need to find ways to
keep the mounds of paper from accumulating. Making it a company-wide adoption
to store only electronic versions of documents is absolutely necessary to
making sure paper does not accumulate.
Here are some
more tips to help make this happen.
Paperless
Billing
If your company
is mailing your bills to vendors and receiving payment by mail you may want to
explore your paperless billing options. Electronic billing makes payments
easier to keep track of while delivering features that help payments to go out
on time.
Get Rid of
Post-its
If you like the
physical appearance of a post-it and are a Windows user, Windows 7’s Sticky
Notes application allows you to write notes that appear on your desktop. Write
as many as you would like and place them anywhere on your desktop and they will
automatically save once you exit the application. Or check out many of the
other post-it type application available for your tablet or smartphone.
E-signing
To collect
signatures, you can avoid printing then re-scanning documents again by securely
sending documents electronically and having them signed in applications like DocuSign
(http://www.docusign.com/).
Utilize Your
Tablet or Smartphone
Often you can
also sign documents directly on your tablet or smartphone screen. Given a paper
document but you are not near your scanner? Apps such as Scanner Pro
(https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/scanner-pro-by-readdle/id333710667?mt=8&ign-
mpt=uo%3D4), allow you to take high resolution photos of your signed pdfs.
Document
Management system
If you are still
overwhelmed by the amount of documents you have electronically stored, consider
using a document management system. It will capture, track, and store your
electronic documents.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment