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How Poor Record Management Can Hurt your Business

6/30/2017

Sloppy record keeping can hurt your business and create a negative image for your company. While it may seem like records are not a core piece holding your business together, they are more important than first meets the eye. Whether you are a big or small business, you must have tax records, budgets, and most likely an employee payroll to take care of. Without proper record management, these three components could be forgotten and jeopardize your business as a whole.

When records are not kept accordingly, it’s easy to lose track of spending and often times a business's budget is exhausted. Things can quickly spiral out of control. Funds will not be available to pay taxes, employees, suppliers, utilities, and other fundamental necessities that keep your business running efficiently. Legal matters can arise as it is illegal not to pay your taxes and employees. As a result, you may be forced to file for bankruptcy.

This seems to be one of the worst cases scenarios. However, poor record management can cause other small hiccups that can easily be avoided. It is quite possible that your records are poorly managed and they are going by unnoticed. Signs of poor record management are: time wasted, inefficiency, poor productivity, lost files, and clutter. These issues are warning signs to a bigger, underlying problem.

Organization is key to a successful business. Maybe it’s time for someone else to take over your document management, check out our previous blog Considering Document Management? “We’re Not Ready” is the Wrong Answer.

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4 Steps to A Successful Document Imaging Plan

6/23/2017

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Business today is executed digitally. Your organization is expected to do more with less. One way to accomplish this and stay in tune with business is through digital records management, and guess what? You won’t have to invest in any new technological equipment. Digital imaging creates digital files of all that paperwork floating around your office. Use these 4 easy steps and say goodbye to piles of documents that you just can’t seem to find when you need them the most.

Decide, is digital imaging right for you? Think of all the times you were looking for that one document when a customer arrives and you can not manage to find it anywhere. Document imaging is great for those items you frequently retrieve. Or how about when you and your co-worker need to use the same document at the same time? When digitizing, you can share documents. This goes for sharing documents with people in different physical locations—you can easily share the digital version via email or fax. Digitizing paperwork will foster a better workflow, as you can simply complete custom searches, utilize different viewing features like zooming, panning, and rotating, and create flags.
Digitize what you need. Not everything needs to go digital. If you are not going to retrieve the document or utilize it, there is no point in digitizing it. Archival paperwork is better left in its original form until it is time to destroy it. It is not time or cost effective to digitize paperwork that you will never use.
Hand it over. Once you have an understanding of what digital imaging can do to improve your business and decided what needs to be digitized, you hand over the paperwork. We then work to scan and digitize your images and place them in a secure environment.
Integrate. Now it is time to integrate this new system into your workplace. Install the software, create accounts for your employees, train the staff on the new system and begin using your documents digitally. Upfront, there is time and money that will need to be invested in the process but there are great benefits in the long run. In many industries, digital records are becoming the standard. Begin the steps to improve your workflow today.

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Keeping Your Office Running Efficiently

6/16/2017

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R4 Services is just like every other company, we have clients, paperwork, and a management system intended to keep it all in check. But even as a document management company, we too at times find ourselves with too much paperwork and not enough order. In these times, we take a step back and assess our document management system.

A successful document management system is there to ease the burden of tracking down individual pieces of paper and information that needs to be kept handy and easily accessible. Even if you already have a system in place, reevaluating and doing some clean-up can keep your office running efficiently and compliant.

1. Assess The Situation: What brought you to this place? Product launch? Tax season? Influx in new hires? No matter the reason, simply start creating piles of related paperwork and media that needs to be kept together.

2. Decide What Is Being Stored Where: Once the piles are created and you have decided what is going to be stored where, space will free up. This ensures documents that need to be accessed can and those that are need for compliance and regulation are secure. Whether you decide on an on-site or off-site storage system, packing up the media and having the boxes indexed will keep everything organized and trackable.

3. Track Dates and Destroy: On-site or off-site, know when documents expire and remain compliant and secure. Keeping documents past their expiration date will lead to an abundance of paperwork that is leaving the company exposed to a potential security threat. Cut down on paper and storage needs by properly destroying of all paperwork and media that is no longer needed.

Implementing a document management system may not be the fastest way, but it is certainly the best way to ensure your business is running as efficiently as possible.

To learn about R4’s Document Management, please contact us today and keep your business running efficiently!

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Media Vaults, Is Your Critical Data Protected?

6/9/2017

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We all know the frustration of looking for a document, flash drive, or photograph and not knowing where it is, only for it to show up later when it is no longer needed. For the data that your organization needs to keep, but doesn’t need to access often, a media vault may be the best solution for you. As the name implies, a media vault is simply that, a vault utilized for the safekeeping of critical documents, media, and any other business critical documents that need protection should a disaster occur.

Since 1993, R4 Services has been providing support to businesses around the Chicagoland area, ensuring that operations can continue to run smoothly should a disaster occur such as a fire, water loss, or espionage.

R4’s Media Vaults are here for your organization and provide the following:

guarantees your data is on-hand and accessible 24/7/365.
provides storage for all types of media and data
provides safe storage and preservation of highly sensitive materials
provides protection via:
- Adherence to strict fire resistant construction standards of the American National Standards Institute
- (ANSI) and the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA)
- Fire protection with FM-200 fire suppression system
- Controlled access and monitored video surveillance
- Temperature and humidity controlled environment, ensuring long-term preservation of your media and data
- Independent HVAC system supported by backup generator
provides a peace of mind knowing that you are receiving the highest level of security and protection

To learn about R4’s Media Vaults, please contact us today and have peace of mind knowing that all critical data pertaining to your business is protected!

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Solutions for ALL Businesses

How Poor Record Management Can Hurt your Business

4 Steps to A Successful Document Imaging Plan

Keeping Your Office Running Efficiently

Media Vaults, Is Your Critical Data Protected?

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