Businesses across the world are well aware of the vulnerabilities and risks that come along with poor document management.
Though, despite the growing awareness about the crimes associated with information, records, and data exposure, incidents still occur. An estimated $1.1 Trillion is lost by businesses across the world due to the exposure of sensitive paper records. In 2017, 2.7 million identity thefts and fraud reports were lodged in the US alone out of which 1.1 million fraud-reports costed consumers a whopping $905 million. The businesses that came under the purview, besides the monetary loss, suffered damaged brand reputation and loss of trusting customers.
Poor document processes within a business leaves it vulnerable to many risks. The major ones that can be averted have been listed below!
1. Disaster and Data Loss
Old-style archiving of the paper documents often creates a bubble of comfort zone within the organization. This bubble mostly goes unnoticed until a mishap or a disaster strikes, wiping all the crucial data and critical information from the archives. Think a natural or a man-made disaster here that can destroy paper documents or damage them beyond recovery if your physical record management system has not been laid out with adequate security measures. Example, fire, floods, etc. Moreover, in the long-run, the physical archive of paper records gets subjected to temperature changes, humidity changes, termites and rodents that increase the risk of damage of business-critical information. Thus, it is necessary that you consult a professional record management firm to mitigate the risks.
2. Delayed Access to the Right Records
The streamlining of a business’ internal processes largely depends upon the speed with which a ‘right record can be retrieved at the right time!’ Poor document processes are often associated with improper documentation, improper curation of the documents (in physical archive or a digital records system), untimely or no Ssecured Shredding, and poor security of the records containing sensitive information. For example, if a business needs a document for legal compliance, litigation
support or finance audits and it cannot be retrieved on time, the business might face serious issues.
Take another scenario into account when a customer asks a business for specific documents. If the company produces them in no time (possible only with the right document management processes), the customer’s trust will be boosted. If the case is otherwise, then the business’ reputation gets placed at the stake!
3. Compliance!
Keeping aside the talks of productivity and customer satisfaction for businesses, legal compliance is one major aspect of document management where defaults would directly translate to penalties and legal action. Poor and broken document management processes can lead a company into serious trouble as a majority of the countries have regulatory laws regarding document preservation and destruction (especially those that relate to identity and business finances). To ensure that you are not caught up into a lawsuit if a third-party sues you for information mishandling, set document processes today and make sure that they are uniform across all the departments.
4. Time and Cost
‘Old-style’ archives that store physical records are notorious for eating up two most precious things your company owns, time and money. If a specific record is required to be retrieved from the archive, then it takes an employee’s time and energy to do so. Moreover, maintaining the paper archives to keep them in ‘shape,’ securing them from the natural damage is also time-consuming. All this, in the long-run, translates into direct and indirect costs. Direct costs come-out in terms of time and maintenance, while the indirect costs come-out as vulnerabilities that might exposed the business to penalties, opportunity cost, etc. What your business might need is an advanced Record management system to preserve your physical records with utmost security at minimal costs. You can get such a solution by partnering with the right vendor.
5. Poor Customer Query Resolution
While most of the companies in major domains have upgraded to digital infrastructure when it comes to handling customers, many of them still operate their account management, client/customer information, and sales information via papers. In case of a customer query, the paper records stored and arranged poorly prove to be highly inefficient simply because of the tediousness of retrieval. On the flip side, a well laid-out Record management system for your paper records and a digital record-management system for information access seamlessly tackles this inefficiency on the fly.
Ensure that your firm never falls into these pitfalls due to lack of record management processes. Consider getting expert insights and record management consulting for your organization today!
