The coronavirus has changed the way businesses operate. Already the number of Americans working from home has quadrupled to 50% according to a recent survey from The National Bureau of Economic Research. Twitter and Square have already offered employees the option to work from home permanently and Facebook is considering doing the same. In fact, a Gartner survey found 74% of U.S. financial leaders are considering having at least part of their staff work remotely from now on.
As companies shift to a partial-to-complete remote strategy, it’s important to find secure, quick ways for your employees to access business documents from anywhere. Access to these documents is critical for many back-office operations, including AP, AR and HR. Here are important factors to consider when moving to a remote workforce model:
Your Physical Mail Can Be Processed Off-Site & Sent to Your Staff Electronically
When the coronavirus hit, many companies had to shut down their office, which caused incoming documents to pile up without any mailroom staff to sort or distribute them. Luckily, with mailroom outsourcing, you can have your mail sent to an external service provider who will open, scan, and index your mail, and then securely distribute it to the appropriate people for review and processing. This removes the need for a physical mailroom in your office, providing a faster, more affordable option to help your remote employees receive the information they need on time. As you create a business continuity plan, outsourcing your mailroom enables a consistent, functional process to help new documents and information reach your staff so they can continue to do their job from home without interruption or delay.
Easily Process Incoming Documents & Manage in the Cloud
While digitally transforming your in-office mailroom, it’s also important to think about how to help your staff review and respond to incoming documents. With cloud software, you can automate workflows and distribute documents electronically to your remote employees based on your business rules for review and processing.
The cloud software also provides management insight into who is working on what document and at what stage of processing it is in, helping you better manage your document processes and remote staff at the same time.
Automate Tasks to Allow Your Remote Team to Focus on Their Core Skills
A study by Stanford University researcher Nicholas Bloom found that workers were 13% more productive–based on their deliverables–when working from home than when they worked in an office. Another way to increase productivity even more is through automating low-skill tasks so that they can focus on their core expertise. By adopting workflow automation software, you can make it take significantly less time for employees to enter information into your system, process invoices and forms, and more. This means they can spend more time using the specialized skills they were hired for, helping grow your business.
Document Management Software Makes It Easier to Access Existing Files from Home
The files you may have previously kept in cabinets in your office can now be digitized, indexed, and accessed securely within seconds from anywhere with cloud document management software. In fact, one of our clients said “Prior to the coronavirus, we brought on MetaSource to help us digitize our files. If we hadn’t, we would have had to completely stop our business due to the coronavirus shutdown, unable to process incoming invoices.” You can decide who has access to what documents and what they can do with them ensuring security and confidentiality of information.
Improve Your Customer Service Even When Your Team Is Working from Home
Once your documents are uploaded into document management software, your team can immediately access them securely from home, improving your customer service experience. In fact, a Genesys study found 9 out of 10 customers appreciate when a business knows their account history and current activities, and only a little over 10% of clients are willing to stay on the line with customer service for over 5 minutes. Instead of scrambling to get your files to remote staff or figuring out how they can be shared by employees working at home and in the office, your files can be digitized at one of our scanning facilities and then uploaded to your virtual file cabinet in the cloud.
Now, when a customer contacts you, your staff has their information at their fingertips within seconds, providing an exceptional customer experience. As put by Brian Tormey, COO of TitleVest after partnering with MetaSource, “When we get a call from the client, it’s not just the pleasure of solving their issue then and there (they expect it to take a few days), but we don’t have to hang up the phone and have a whole series of tasks we have to do, saving each employee 15-20 minutes per request at least a few times a day, across our client-facing employees.”
Have a Clear Paper Trail Accessible from Anywhere in Case of an Audit
If your company is audited, your employees do not need to return to the office to complete the process. With cloud document management software, you can provide a complete audit trail that’s accessible from anywhere. Temporary access to a defined population of documents can be provided to the auditors for a specific period of time, eliminating any intrusion on your operations and disruption to your staff’s focus. Being able to track who has done what with each document is critical for meeting compliance requirements and avoiding penalties.
Remote Processes Help Your Company Maintain Business Continuity
Digitization is a necessary step in not only keeping your business running right now, but also benefits your business in numerous ways, including improving your processes, efficiency, productivity, and more. From outsourcing your mailroom to migrating your documents to the cloud, all of these processes makes it easier for your company to operate while your staff is working from home. It can also save you money, making your company more competitive, which is especially important right now.