The benefits of document management can be split into two categories those of tangible and intangible benefits. Let us first take a look at the tangible benefits a document management system has to offer;

• Scanning documents and integrating them into a document management system can greatly reduce the amount of prime storage space required by paper. The ever increasing cost of commercial premises (especially those of central city locations) can present a major cost saving.
• Staff productivity is increased due to the time saved in searching for documents stored on paper or microfilm.
• The ability to answer telephone queries due to almost instant access to information negates the need to call clients back.
• A reduction in photocopying, faxing and courier/mail document transport as everybody refers to an electronic copy of the document.
• Improved cashflow through increased productivity of processing invoices and “cash critical” business documents.
• A reduction in the time and money spent searching and recreating lost documents. A well respected company found in 2000 that an average company spends $157.00 searching for a misfiled document, loses 1 in 20 documents and spends $333.71 creating a lost document. How would those figures stack up in 2008?

And the intangible benefits….

• Better control of the security, monitoring and flow of information.
• Reduced time-to-market for products and services providing a competitive edge over your competitors.
• Improved customer service and satisfaction due to increased response times, allowing you staff to concentrate on core business activities.
• Reduced chance of manufacturing and/or incorrect information being referenced due to lax revision control.