I think some of Janie's points are well-taken, but I would argue that
they aren't complete.

I would never advocate imaging all paper documents. It is far cheaper
to store dead records in boxes in a commercial records center than
convert the same documents to images.

However, if the images need to be processed offshore, if there can be
parallel processes applied to the images to speed up an overall
process, if vital records protection is an additional concern, or if
the documents support a call center operation, I would argue that
images are far and away a more effective means of maintaining
information than paper.

The last point is the most critical in my company. When someone calls,
you want to be able to review the file during the initial call rather
than calling the person back. Every call costs money and if you're
playing phone tag with a caller, it is extraordinarily expensive, plus
it is very disconcerting to the caller when you don't have an answer in
real time.

With globalized business processes a reality in many organizations,
only electronic imaging can enable these processes to happen. 

I am an advocate of retaining imaged paper for not more than 90 days
after image capture. I've worked in other organizations where the
imaged paper was retained for 30 days. Your approach here depends upon
your processes and customer expectations. In our business, we've found
that most rescans take place in the first 10-15 days. Keep in mind that
as long as the original paper exists, it may be considered the best
evidence and may have to be produced. Frankly, producing paper records
that have been scanned and stored in scan batches is going to be
extremely expensive -- and deprepping the records to "normal" filing is
also an expensive proposition -- particularly when those "normal" files
will likely never be needed.

Patrick Cunningham, CRM

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