Advantages and Drawbacks of Document Imaging

If documents are effectively managed and converted to the required formats then it will directly affect the success of an organization. All valuable documents of an organization are converted to meaningful digital formats for easy access and documentation. All your contracts, sales, administration etc will only work smoothly if document imaging is done properly. Document imaging also has some drawbacks as it has advantages.

There are several advantages of document image processing some of them are:

Permanent Backup: Document imaging provides you with permanent backing solutions, even if your data may be lost during a disaster, you will have data backup stored in some server this would help you in preserving your data permanently.

Affordable costs: You could cut up your unwanted cost on managing and handling paper documents, and you could also cut up on employee cost that is required in arranging and documenting the paper documents.

Increased security: If your data falls into the wrong hands then it could even affect credibility of your organization. Your data will be secure as there may be security mechanisms to protect your data from theft and other piracy mechanisms. The access will be controlled by authorized members others will have to gain access from the authorized person to perform any kind of manipulation to the data.

Accessibility: Since the documents are digitized and indexed they can be easily accessed, the documents are indexed and arranged so to access a document from huge pile of documents can be done within seconds. If it were paper documents, to access a required file will be like searching for a needle in a haystack.

Environmental reasons: There are several environmental advantages too; when documents are digitized it would help save a lot of trees since paper documents are replaced by e-documents. Paper consumption will be reduced and it could help save a lot of trees and it would have a huge impact on environment.

Drawbacks of Document Imaging

Incorrect indexing: If indexing of document is incorrect or if any mistake occurs when documents are indexed the whole system will be at fault and this could affect the proper working of your organization.               

All at once imaging: If you try to convert all your documents at once it would affect proper working of your organization and it would become hard to handle and manage them. Converting your documents part by part is the best choice this would make your task efficient and will provide smooth working of your organization.

Accuracy problems: Since data is stored in paper formats converting those to digital formats is a difficult task as accuracy may be lost while converting. Sometimes the paper maybe in torn formats or the letters may be in unidentifiable state so while converting these documents 100% accuracy cannot be obtained this would affect the quality of the works.

Hidden costs: There can be hidden labor costs, if constant communication is not kept and the requirements and needs are not properly understood then cost will not stop where you want it to stop it will rocket. The cost will increase and you would have to provide additional cost for all the extra works done.