Electronic document management systems have become an indispensable part of the contemporary corporate world. They have replaced the old fashioned wooden cabinets which were used to store files. DMS have the power to change the business organisations from the paper-laden, confused and sluggish box ticking operations into highly dynamic and efficient power-houses saving time and increasing capacity. Today, professionals in medical, government and legal institutions are retrieving and storing information through computerised systems. The use of DMS has made life easier for both the management and employees. This piece of article aims to highlight a few benefits of using DMS.

Reduced Storage

the cost of property required to store documentation, for example, retrieval compliance means that as paper based storage requires more space, it competes with employees for space in an organisation. Scanning documents and storing them into a DMS reduces the amount of storage space needed by the paper to a great extent.

Go Green

The use of DMS in the business organisations is saving trees all over the globe. According to the Association of Records Managers and Administrators, each worker in the United States of America uses ten thousand sheets of paper, which is equal to 1.24 tress per person. Discarded sheets of paper turns into methane gas. By making use of an EDMS process, businesses can protect the forests as well can decrease gasoline usage. Employees can even work from their homes or some other location when they have an easy access of computerised recorded from secured servers or websites. When more people would work from home, there will be less traffic on road, thus less vehicle emission.

Access

Retrieving data through computers is much easier as compared to working with paper copies. In an office, one document is copied several times because multiple employees have to work with that information. However, in case of computers, more than one employee can see the records at a point of time. Employer has an easy control on all the data. In addition, security features allows an employer to find out who has accessed which file. Another, important advantage of using EDM is the rapid recovery of data during disasters such as office burglary, flood and fire. Often, backup copies are stored off site.

Flexible Indexing

Indexing microfilm and paper in more than one ways can done using EDM, however it is slightly time consuming and expensive. Images or visuals stored within an EDM can be indexed in different ways.

Apart from the above mentioned benefits, cost savings and improved security are two other advantages of using EDM.