Elysia Guzik wrote:
> Hello collective wisdom,
>
>  
>
> My organization is currently considering moving to a paperless approach to managing records. As part of our research for this project, I've been asked to calculate cost estimates for maintaining paper records (compared to electronic), from both a resourcing and real estate perspective. If you have used tools/ tip sheets/ publications/ websites/ blogs that have proved to be helpful for similar estimates, I'd be happy to hear from you.
>   

> Elysia,
>   
Some of the factors you need to consider on the "hard-copy storage" side 
would be: cost of purchase or lease of suitable building, lost 
opportunity costs of money so used, management cost of finding building, 
preparing contracts, closing costs, capital costs for shelving, 
inventory management (e.g., computers, software, bar code printers, 
scanners) etc.; then there are annual recurring costs such as property 
taxes, facility insurance, liability insurance, maintenance, utilities, 
staffing, telecommunications, office supplies, transportation, storage 
boxes, disposal costs, training, etc.  You will still have some or all 
of these costs if you go digital from some date forward and don't image 
stored material (you can store a box of records for about 35 years 
before it becomes cost effective to image the contents).

On the paperless side you have: management costs associated with 
identifying an RM system or systems, higher staffing costs for more 
skilled staff (e.g., IT), training, capital costs for computers, 
acquisition costs for software, re-capitalization costs every five years 
or so for hardware and software systems, costs associated with imaging 
(e.g., computers, scanners, staff) for material not born digital or back 
files, migration costs, compliance costs, costs to upgrade electrical, 
back-up power, costs of "hot" sites or failover sites, ER discovery 
costs that may be higher than for hard copy, all the same costs for 
e-mail capture, space costs for server rooms and environmental control, 
increased staff (rule of thumb has usually been 20% increase in staffing 
level for automation projects), costs for off-site back-up (see hot 
sites above), quality control for document capture, e-mail capture & 
imaging. office supplies, Maalox, etc.

These are a few of my favorite things.  Oh, and double management 
costs.  Dick King, University of Arizona (and just my spur-of-the-moment 
thoughts.)

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