Posted by Mark Brousseau
AHIMA's 82nd Annual Conference and Exhibit, held this week at the Gaylord Palms Hotel and Convention Center in Orlando, Florida, may not have featured "Earth-shattering new products" or "game-changing players," but it did have something that made exhibitors smile: better booth traffic.
"I can't say that I saw any new products at AHIMA," says exhibitor Greg Lusch (glusch@ibml.com), ibml's (www.ibml.com) business development manager for healthcare. But attendance at the event -- which draws coders, transcriptionists and other medical records professionals -- was noticeably higher than in recent years, Lusch adds, resulting in a steady stream of potential buyers visiting the Birmingham, Alabama-based company's booth. He attributes the increased buying interest to the "loosening economy" and strong demand for ICD-10 and electronic health records (EHR) solutions.
"There was a sense among the exhibitors that attendees had a little more money to spend," he says.
If the AHIMA conference is any indication, healthcare providers will spend a lot of that money on ICD-10 initiatives. In 2013, the U.S. healthcare system will transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10 as the HIPAA mandated code set for medical symptoms and procedures. This code set is used for billing and health insurance reimbursement, as well as statistical analysis, clinical, epidemiological and quality reporting. As a result of this transition, Lusch notes that the number of diagnosis codes will swell from 13,000 to 68,000, while the number of procedure codes will soar from 3,000 to 87,000.
"ICD-10 was by far the hottest topic at AHIMA," Lusch says. "Many attendees were there to better understand how to deal with ICD-10; how to make the transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10, what tools and updates were available to help streamline the process, and, in many cases, to find third-party services to help them figure it all out. Clearly, this was a major area of focus for AHIMA attendees."
The other area of focus for many AHIMA attendees was the conversion to EHRs. Lusch notes that in addition to hospitals and large practices -- which have been showing increasing interest in EHR solutions at conferences throughout the year -- a number of service bureaus were at AHIMA sizing up the potential opportunity, looking for EHR solutions of their own, or offering conversion services. "There is no question that more service bureaus are jumping on the EHR bandwagon, offering to scan medical records on behalf of healthcare providers. They clearly believe there is a lot of scanning business out there."
Interestingly, Lusch noted that many of the large EHR solutions vendors did not exhibit at AHIMA.
Noticeably absent from most of the exhibit hall banter was any talk of health reform. That's not to say that it didn't come up during some sessions. But Lusch thinks AHIMA attendees were "too consumed" with the major tasks of ICD-10 and EHRs to focus on the uncertainties of reform.
Showing posts with label scanning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label scanning. Show all posts
Friday, October 1, 2010
Monday, August 30, 2010
6 Questions to Ask When Shopping for a Remittance Solution
By Mark Brousseau
Buying a remittance processing solution has never been easy. But the combination of emerging payment and clearing channels, expanding systems integration requirements, and new customer service demands has made the process more confusing than ever.
To add some clarity, Wally Vogel (wvogel@creditron.com), founder and CEO of Creditron, Inc. (www.creditron) offers the following six questions to ask a prospective remittance solutions vendors.
1. How much opening and pre-sorting is required before scanning incoming remittance work?
Bearing in mind that there are often several steps required to move from unopened mail to stacks of clean sorted documents, which some remittance solutions require, Vogel suggests looking at the remittance solution in the context of the end-to-end operation. "Look for a vendor that can integrate with an efficient mail opening system and handle a variety of transaction type without requiring pre-sorting," Vogel advises.
2. What about payments that are made in person or over the web?
The mix of payments has changed and will continue to change, and spending money on a solution that only handles mail payments no longer makes sense, Vogel says. "A remittance platform worth investing in should have fully integrated cashiering, web payments, and credit card payments, with consolidated deposits, accounting updates, and reports," Vogel says.
3. Have you successfully interfaced with our ERP/accounting system/billing system/content management software before?
This is an area of potential hidden costs and problems if not addressed upfront, Vogel warns. "You have a significant investment in your information systems, and front end capture points such as remittance processing need to work seamlessly or the result will be unexpected integration work by your IS group, or worse, unforeseen problems with your data down the road," Vogel says.
4. Have you successfully implemented Check 21 Image Cash Letter with our bank before?
This is another potential problem if your remittance vendor and bank are not on the same page, Vogel says. "Don’t get caught in between. Use a vendor that has already proven that they can work with your bank, or if your bank does not have a process and certification in place for working with third party vendors consider using another bank for image cash letter services and having the funds swept to your main bank on a daily basis," Vogel recommends.
5. Is this a fully proven and tested solution or will there be any customized code?
Unless you want to be a beta tester, you should choose a vendor that has completely standardized and proven code that can be configured to your needs through parameters. "Even a small block of customized code can cause problems with reliability or integrity, and make later updates problematic and expensive," Vogel explains. "Choose a vendor with a standard codebase and an easy method to upgrade to the latest revision."
6. Are you a Microsoft Certified partner?
"If you are putting wiring in your house, you insist on a licensed electrician. If you want legal advice, you look for a lawyer that has passed the bar. Similarly, if you are choosing a remittance software provider to work in the Microsoft Windows environment, you should insist in a Microsoft Certified Partner," Vogel says. "This ensures that you are dealing with a professional and qualified organization which has made the investment in certifying their people and products before asking you to make an investment in their solutions."
Do you have any tips you can share?
Buying a remittance processing solution has never been easy. But the combination of emerging payment and clearing channels, expanding systems integration requirements, and new customer service demands has made the process more confusing than ever.
To add some clarity, Wally Vogel (wvogel@creditron.com), founder and CEO of Creditron, Inc. (www.creditron) offers the following six questions to ask a prospective remittance solutions vendors.
1. How much opening and pre-sorting is required before scanning incoming remittance work?
Bearing in mind that there are often several steps required to move from unopened mail to stacks of clean sorted documents, which some remittance solutions require, Vogel suggests looking at the remittance solution in the context of the end-to-end operation. "Look for a vendor that can integrate with an efficient mail opening system and handle a variety of transaction type without requiring pre-sorting," Vogel advises.
2. What about payments that are made in person or over the web?
The mix of payments has changed and will continue to change, and spending money on a solution that only handles mail payments no longer makes sense, Vogel says. "A remittance platform worth investing in should have fully integrated cashiering, web payments, and credit card payments, with consolidated deposits, accounting updates, and reports," Vogel says.
3. Have you successfully interfaced with our ERP/accounting system/billing system/content management software before?
This is an area of potential hidden costs and problems if not addressed upfront, Vogel warns. "You have a significant investment in your information systems, and front end capture points such as remittance processing need to work seamlessly or the result will be unexpected integration work by your IS group, or worse, unforeseen problems with your data down the road," Vogel says.
4. Have you successfully implemented Check 21 Image Cash Letter with our bank before?
This is another potential problem if your remittance vendor and bank are not on the same page, Vogel says. "Don’t get caught in between. Use a vendor that has already proven that they can work with your bank, or if your bank does not have a process and certification in place for working with third party vendors consider using another bank for image cash letter services and having the funds swept to your main bank on a daily basis," Vogel recommends.
5. Is this a fully proven and tested solution or will there be any customized code?
Unless you want to be a beta tester, you should choose a vendor that has completely standardized and proven code that can be configured to your needs through parameters. "Even a small block of customized code can cause problems with reliability or integrity, and make later updates problematic and expensive," Vogel explains. "Choose a vendor with a standard codebase and an easy method to upgrade to the latest revision."
6. Are you a Microsoft Certified partner?
"If you are putting wiring in your house, you insist on a licensed electrician. If you want legal advice, you look for a lawyer that has passed the bar. Similarly, if you are choosing a remittance software provider to work in the Microsoft Windows environment, you should insist in a Microsoft Certified Partner," Vogel says. "This ensures that you are dealing with a professional and qualified organization which has made the investment in certifying their people and products before asking you to make an investment in their solutions."
Do you have any tips you can share?
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Putting the kibosh on the soaring software maintenance and upgrade costs
By Randy Davis (rdavis@egisticsinc.com)
Finextra reports that in a recent speech to the Committee for Economic Development in Australia (CEDA), CBA Chief Information Officer Michael Harte lambasted legacy technology vendors for their slow embrace of cloud-based computing and their apparent preference for solutions that lock-in users to a "never-ending spiral" of costly maintenance and upgrades.
"We're saying that we will never buy another data center. We will never buy another rack or server or storage device or network device again," Harte said. "I will never let any organization that I work for get locked into proprietary hardware or software again. I'll never tell my teams in the business that it will be weeks to get them hardware provision. I'll never pay upfront for any infrastructure and certainly would never pay for any, or rent any, infrastructure that I would never use."
Harte concluded: "I will never implement an internal solution for a common problem that I could procure on subscription across the Web."
With increasing demand for cloud-based solutions, combined with a general reluctance to pay hefty upfront capital costs, Harte's comments would seem to reflect growing dissatisfaction with the traditional licensed software model -- and its “never-ending spiral” of ongoing expenses.
Are you as fed-up as Harte?
Finextra reports that in a recent speech to the Committee for Economic Development in Australia (CEDA), CBA Chief Information Officer Michael Harte lambasted legacy technology vendors for their slow embrace of cloud-based computing and their apparent preference for solutions that lock-in users to a "never-ending spiral" of costly maintenance and upgrades.
"We're saying that we will never buy another data center. We will never buy another rack or server or storage device or network device again," Harte said. "I will never let any organization that I work for get locked into proprietary hardware or software again. I'll never tell my teams in the business that it will be weeks to get them hardware provision. I'll never pay upfront for any infrastructure and certainly would never pay for any, or rent any, infrastructure that I would never use."
Harte concluded: "I will never implement an internal solution for a common problem that I could procure on subscription across the Web."
With increasing demand for cloud-based solutions, combined with a general reluctance to pay hefty upfront capital costs, Harte's comments would seem to reflect growing dissatisfaction with the traditional licensed software model -- and its “never-ending spiral” of ongoing expenses.
Are you as fed-up as Harte?
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Paper shuffling continues
Posted by Mark Brousseau
“While I’m not surprised that we haven’t seen the ‘Holy Grail’ of putting co-mingled documents into a scanner, and letting the system and software figure it out, I am surprised by the amount of manual processes in place at most companies,” Mark Smith of OPEX said during a panel discussion Monday at FUSION 2010 at the Gaylord Texan Resort & Convention Center in Grapevine, Texas. The panel brought together document management solutions providers to offer their perspectives on the results of TAWPI’s 2009 Document Management Study.
Smith noted that 67 percent of survey respondents indicated that they are still inserting document separators. “That is a ton of document separators – with expensive paper and ink,” Smith said.
ibml’s Derrick Murphy told attendees that he was surprised by the lower-than-expected adoption rate of automated document classification technology. “This reminds me of the days when people thought ICR [intelligent character recognition] was going to save the day,” Murphy said. “The problem with auto-classification is the high costs associated with miss-classifications and errors. The technology simply has to become more intelligent. When that happens, it will open up a tremendous amount of cost savings, as well as opportunities to better leverage intelligent scanners to out-sort documents based on their content.”
Jim Wanner of KeyMark also was struck by “the lack of software utilized for front-end document classification.”
Murphy added that he was surprised that less than two-thirds of survey respondents track their imaging production rates. “If you don’t track your production rates, you can’t accurately track your costs,” Murphy noted. “And, in this economy, I’m shocked that operations wouldn’t want to know their true costs.”
Jim Thumma of Optical Image Technology (OIT) said organizations should strive to track their document management costs end-to-end -- from capture to archive -- to look for opportunities to remove inefficiencies.
“While I’m not surprised that we haven’t seen the ‘Holy Grail’ of putting co-mingled documents into a scanner, and letting the system and software figure it out, I am surprised by the amount of manual processes in place at most companies,” Mark Smith of OPEX said during a panel discussion Monday at FUSION 2010 at the Gaylord Texan Resort & Convention Center in Grapevine, Texas. The panel brought together document management solutions providers to offer their perspectives on the results of TAWPI’s 2009 Document Management Study.
Smith noted that 67 percent of survey respondents indicated that they are still inserting document separators. “That is a ton of document separators – with expensive paper and ink,” Smith said.
ibml’s Derrick Murphy told attendees that he was surprised by the lower-than-expected adoption rate of automated document classification technology. “This reminds me of the days when people thought ICR [intelligent character recognition] was going to save the day,” Murphy said. “The problem with auto-classification is the high costs associated with miss-classifications and errors. The technology simply has to become more intelligent. When that happens, it will open up a tremendous amount of cost savings, as well as opportunities to better leverage intelligent scanners to out-sort documents based on their content.”
Jim Wanner of KeyMark also was struck by “the lack of software utilized for front-end document classification.”
Murphy added that he was surprised that less than two-thirds of survey respondents track their imaging production rates. “If you don’t track your production rates, you can’t accurately track your costs,” Murphy noted. “And, in this economy, I’m shocked that operations wouldn’t want to know their true costs.”
Jim Thumma of Optical Image Technology (OIT) said organizations should strive to track their document management costs end-to-end -- from capture to archive -- to look for opportunities to remove inefficiencies.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
A Compelling ROI for Document Management
By Mark Brousseau
Organizations hungry for productivity gains in light of the economic downturn will likely find a compelling return on investment from document capture solutions, Andrew Pery, chief marketing officer at Kofax said this morning during a keynote presentation at TAWPI’s Capture Conference.
“If document capture is looked at as part of your mission-critical business process, and you integrate that into your business applications, then the savings are quite significant and compelling,” Pery said.
One common measure of a return on investment calculation is the average total savings over three years, divided by the cost, Pery told attendees. What factors drive this return on investment?
… Breadth – “How many people will the application affect?”
… Repeatability – “How many times a day will people use it?”
… Cost – “Is this a costly task?”
… Collaboration – “Will employees need to collaborate?”
… Knowledge – “Can I reuse the information I create?”
“One of the most important metrics is the payback -- the time period needed before net savings equal initial cost,” Pery said. “Organizations tend to pay a lot of attention to this because the shorter the payback the higher the probability the project will be adopted,” Pery explained to attendees.
Key to this payback is productivity gains from reductions in cost (direct savings), expected reductions in cost, increases in worker productivity, and increases in manager productivity.
“When someone creates an ROI analysis, particularly in these tough economic times, the focus primarily is on direct savings,” Pery said. And this is a reason for the growth of document capture. “Document capture, in terms of annual growth potential, is expected to outperform virtually every other segment of the software market because users recognize the potential direct cost savings.”
For instance, the economic value of automating invoice processing is increased processing efficiencies, improved ability to audit, improved visibility across AP, and streamlined research.
The bottom line, Pery said is to choose products and services that consider document-driven process automation as a strategic investment.
What do you think? Post your comments below.
Organizations hungry for productivity gains in light of the economic downturn will likely find a compelling return on investment from document capture solutions, Andrew Pery, chief marketing officer at Kofax said this morning during a keynote presentation at TAWPI’s Capture Conference.
“If document capture is looked at as part of your mission-critical business process, and you integrate that into your business applications, then the savings are quite significant and compelling,” Pery said.
One common measure of a return on investment calculation is the average total savings over three years, divided by the cost, Pery told attendees. What factors drive this return on investment?
… Breadth – “How many people will the application affect?”
… Repeatability – “How many times a day will people use it?”
… Cost – “Is this a costly task?”
… Collaboration – “Will employees need to collaborate?”
… Knowledge – “Can I reuse the information I create?”
“One of the most important metrics is the payback -- the time period needed before net savings equal initial cost,” Pery said. “Organizations tend to pay a lot of attention to this because the shorter the payback the higher the probability the project will be adopted,” Pery explained to attendees.
Key to this payback is productivity gains from reductions in cost (direct savings), expected reductions in cost, increases in worker productivity, and increases in manager productivity.
“When someone creates an ROI analysis, particularly in these tough economic times, the focus primarily is on direct savings,” Pery said. And this is a reason for the growth of document capture. “Document capture, in terms of annual growth potential, is expected to outperform virtually every other segment of the software market because users recognize the potential direct cost savings.”
For instance, the economic value of automating invoice processing is increased processing efficiencies, improved ability to audit, improved visibility across AP, and streamlined research.
The bottom line, Pery said is to choose products and services that consider document-driven process automation as a strategic investment.
What do you think? Post your comments below.
Monday, August 18, 2008
The Value of Business Intelligence
Posted by Mark Brousseau
An interesting article from ComputerWeekly.com on the value of document management:
Information management to deliver real value to businesses
Author: Joe O'Halloran
Posted: 14:32 11 Aug 2008
Topics: Data Management Business Intelligence Compliance
Information management (IM) solutions are moving to the centre of IT strategies as a way of driving IT and business alignment and delivering real and visible value to the business, according to a recent survey from Forrester research.
The market analyst believes that the driver for such a move is the fact that wherever there is a hot growth market in IT, there will be plenty of IT consultants, systems integrators, and managed services providers to help architect, plan, implement, and manage the solution.
After surveying vendors of both IM software and services to assess the size of the IM services market, Forrester expects the global information services market to grow from its present value of $7.9 billion to $10.9 billion by 2012, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.2%.
Business intelligence (BI) and business performance solutions will likely dominate this spend, although Forrester adds that the information strategy segment will see the fastest growth throughout the forecast period.
Data warehouse services should also witness strong growth over the next two years as with greater interest in and deployment of BI and BPS solutions, the requirements for data warehouses to store all of the data should also grow commensurately. On a long term basis, data warehouses will likely start to take over some of the functions typically found in the data management segment and also require more consulting and integration services.
Forrester also thinks that content management and portal services should witness high growth in 2009. It says the content management market has consistently underperformed the high expectations set for it and that even though the promise of enterprise content management (ECM) solutions has never really been delivered by the software providers, in those cases where heavy ECM solutions have failed, portals are beginning to deliver. Some organisations are beginning to use portals as their ad hoc ECM solution, and Forrester predicts that this trend will accelerate in 2009.
Forrester advises firms to define clearly and information management services strategy and adhere to it, ensuring that it can take the company forward, should the current focus segment start to merge with another. It adds that firms should assess core competencies as part of the strategic due diligence in defining a strategy, put them into context with the total market opportunity, and balance a portfolio of new areas and old areas.
Are business intelligence intelligence solutions playing a more central role in your enterprise IT planning? Post your comment below.
An interesting article from ComputerWeekly.com on the value of document management:
Information management to deliver real value to businesses
Author: Joe O'Halloran
Posted: 14:32 11 Aug 2008
Topics: Data Management Business Intelligence Compliance
Information management (IM) solutions are moving to the centre of IT strategies as a way of driving IT and business alignment and delivering real and visible value to the business, according to a recent survey from Forrester research.
The market analyst believes that the driver for such a move is the fact that wherever there is a hot growth market in IT, there will be plenty of IT consultants, systems integrators, and managed services providers to help architect, plan, implement, and manage the solution.
After surveying vendors of both IM software and services to assess the size of the IM services market, Forrester expects the global information services market to grow from its present value of $7.9 billion to $10.9 billion by 2012, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.2%.
Business intelligence (BI) and business performance solutions will likely dominate this spend, although Forrester adds that the information strategy segment will see the fastest growth throughout the forecast period.
Data warehouse services should also witness strong growth over the next two years as with greater interest in and deployment of BI and BPS solutions, the requirements for data warehouses to store all of the data should also grow commensurately. On a long term basis, data warehouses will likely start to take over some of the functions typically found in the data management segment and also require more consulting and integration services.
Forrester also thinks that content management and portal services should witness high growth in 2009. It says the content management market has consistently underperformed the high expectations set for it and that even though the promise of enterprise content management (ECM) solutions has never really been delivered by the software providers, in those cases where heavy ECM solutions have failed, portals are beginning to deliver. Some organisations are beginning to use portals as their ad hoc ECM solution, and Forrester predicts that this trend will accelerate in 2009.
Forrester advises firms to define clearly and information management services strategy and adhere to it, ensuring that it can take the company forward, should the current focus segment start to merge with another. It adds that firms should assess core competencies as part of the strategic due diligence in defining a strategy, put them into context with the total market opportunity, and balance a portfolio of new areas and old areas.
Are business intelligence intelligence solutions playing a more central role in your enterprise IT planning? Post your comment below.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Changing Scanner Business Case
By Mark Brousseau
There's no question that the business case for distributed scanners is changing, says Don McMahan, vice president of sales and regional general manager, US&C, Document Imaging, Graphic Communications Group, for Eastman Kodak Company.
"Since introduction, distributed scanners have provided a way for all organizations to take advantage of dedicated document capture solutions," McMahan told me. "These technologies were previously only available to organizations whose budgets could support both costly equipment as well as trained personnel to operate it."
"That said, the benefits of distributed scanners are also being realized within the broader market. Even larger firms that have centralized scanning operations have recognized the additional benefits in implementing distributed capture," McMahan explained. "Why should having a budget for production scanning capabilities and skilled personnel be detrimental to continued growth and success? Combining an existing deep bench with distributed scanning at the right points within an organization can enhance efficiencies many times."
McMahan said that equipping field offices with distributed scanners enables employees at these locations to quickly share documents they receive with the main facility for processing. These technologies immediately alleviate the cost and hassle with overnight mail, including delivery delays, or losing documents altogether.
"Furthermore, capturing information at the point of acceptance enables companies to quickly get it into their document management systems. This promises faster access to information, decision making, and by extension, increased customer satisfaction ultimately making the business more efficient and profitable," he said. "Technical innovations equate to enhanced capabilities, ease of use, and improved system connectivity for distributed scanning. We’re observing how distributed capture is not only changing how document capture better serves current end users, but also the landscape of who the average end users will be in the future."
McMahan said Kodak expects to see more pre-packaged solutions for a variety of vertical industries. The continued advancements in imaging hardware and software will move distributed capture beyond the primary benefits of document scanning towards highly specialized applications for information management solutions, he added. Many of these solutions will be equally at home in both distributed and centralized scanning operations.
There's no question that the business case for distributed scanners is changing, says Don McMahan, vice president of sales and regional general manager, US&C, Document Imaging, Graphic Communications Group, for Eastman Kodak Company.
"Since introduction, distributed scanners have provided a way for all organizations to take advantage of dedicated document capture solutions," McMahan told me. "These technologies were previously only available to organizations whose budgets could support both costly equipment as well as trained personnel to operate it."
"That said, the benefits of distributed scanners are also being realized within the broader market. Even larger firms that have centralized scanning operations have recognized the additional benefits in implementing distributed capture," McMahan explained. "Why should having a budget for production scanning capabilities and skilled personnel be detrimental to continued growth and success? Combining an existing deep bench with distributed scanning at the right points within an organization can enhance efficiencies many times."
McMahan said that equipping field offices with distributed scanners enables employees at these locations to quickly share documents they receive with the main facility for processing. These technologies immediately alleviate the cost and hassle with overnight mail, including delivery delays, or losing documents altogether.
"Furthermore, capturing information at the point of acceptance enables companies to quickly get it into their document management systems. This promises faster access to information, decision making, and by extension, increased customer satisfaction ultimately making the business more efficient and profitable," he said. "Technical innovations equate to enhanced capabilities, ease of use, and improved system connectivity for distributed scanning. We’re observing how distributed capture is not only changing how document capture better serves current end users, but also the landscape of who the average end users will be in the future."
McMahan said Kodak expects to see more pre-packaged solutions for a variety of vertical industries. The continued advancements in imaging hardware and software will move distributed capture beyond the primary benefits of document scanning towards highly specialized applications for information management solutions, he added. Many of these solutions will be equally at home in both distributed and centralized scanning operations.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Production Scanning Still Hot
By Mark Brousseau
Don’t let the growth of workgroup and distributed scanning fool you – there is still a need for production scanners, particularly among companies implementing shared services organizations. That’s according to Mark Fairchild, senior vice president, technology portfolio management, at BancTec, Inc. Fairchild noted that many shared services programs begin with financial business processes, but expand to include general document processing.
Demand for production scanners is particularly strong in the accounts payable space, Fairchild told me, where manufacturers, utilities and retailers, among others, are looking to automate invoice processing. Meantime, declining check volumes has created an opportunity in the financial services arena for scanners that can handle documents and checks comingled, he said.
Not surprisingly, Fairchild says BancTec continues to see growth in its high-speed scanner sales, with financial services and educational testing companies and service bureaus leading the way. The draw? Reductions in labor and customer service costs, and improved quality.
What do you think? E-mail me at m_brousseau@msn.com.
Don’t let the growth of workgroup and distributed scanning fool you – there is still a need for production scanners, particularly among companies implementing shared services organizations. That’s according to Mark Fairchild, senior vice president, technology portfolio management, at BancTec, Inc. Fairchild noted that many shared services programs begin with financial business processes, but expand to include general document processing.
Demand for production scanners is particularly strong in the accounts payable space, Fairchild told me, where manufacturers, utilities and retailers, among others, are looking to automate invoice processing. Meantime, declining check volumes has created an opportunity in the financial services arena for scanners that can handle documents and checks comingled, he said.
Not surprisingly, Fairchild says BancTec continues to see growth in its high-speed scanner sales, with financial services and educational testing companies and service bureaus leading the way. The draw? Reductions in labor and customer service costs, and improved quality.
What do you think? E-mail me at m_brousseau@msn.com.
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