[StephAV]

We aren’t officially going paperless, but I think that will eventually happen. Our current issue is A/R wants a copy made of every check we deposit and that is a lot of checks and we are trying to grow. Nobody wants to sit at the copier and so I have this vision of scanning batches for deposit. We got a Fujitsu ScanSnap (amazing reviews on Amazon) for A/R and it has been kind of a fail. Management (my boss) feels that a check scanner won’t save time and our bank has ridiculous fees for this service. I’m contemplating getting another scanner, possibly the same kind at an empty work station in our department with the hopes of being able to put a stack of 50 documents (just as an example) it would be a mix of checks and invoices. Any advice on scanners that are awesome or some best practices that have worked for you in a similar situation?

FAR - 7/13 - 72, 11/13- 74, 2/14- 82!!! Best score ever (for me)!!!
BEC - 1/14 - 75!!! Perfect score! First Pass! YAY!!!
AUD - 8/14 - 80!!!
REG - 5/14 - 72, 10/14 - 66, 1/15 - 78 - DONE FOREVER!!!
I did 5 of the UNA and CPAExcel classes to earn units.

[JMOR]

The Scan Snap is no good, we used to have them. We now have a Fujitsu Fi-6130 or Fi-7160 at each workstation. They are amazing and work so much better than the Scan Snaps. The Fi series are Twain compliant and scan color, grayscale or B&W at varying resolutions and can do up to 60 or more pages per minute. They are a bit spendy though, you are probably looking at around $700-$800ish.

REG - 86
FAR - 74,
BEC - 72,
AUD -73,

[mla1169]

I convinced one of my previous employers to go paperless back in 2003. It was quite a feat to convince an employer back then! We did not do the scanning ourselves, we outsourced it. We set up 4 databases (a/r, a,p, H/R, and engineering.) Getting it set up was challenging. Once it was off the ground it couldn't have been easier. For example for A/P we'd do our check run and match it to the backup. Had boxes of bar coded paper and just slipped a bar code between each individual check. Every Friday the doc company would pick up my box and the following Monday I'd have a CD to download. (I'm sure now its all online).

2 things-the document company will tell you its something ridiculous like .04 per page. They are ALWAYS willing to negotiate (depending on volume of course). I think we got them down to .005/page.. We probably spent about $240/month but the cost analysis I gave them was compelling. We would have spent at LEAST $100/mo in payroll to do the scanning, not to mention either leasing or depreciating a huge scanner (you're not going to use a desktop scanner for this). And we freed up hundreds of square feet of floor space by getting rid of the file cabinets we had in the office which kept us from having to lease additional office space for over 5 years as we were growing.

My prior employer STILL uses the same document company. and is very pleased with them.

FAR- 77
AUD -49, 71, 84
REG -56,75!
BEC -75

Massachusetts CPA (non reporting) since 3/12.

[StephAV]

I knew I'd get some good info on here! I'm thinking about proposing one of those in the short term. I didn't even realize that you could outsource your scanning. Did a quick google search and it sounds amazing! Definitely the way to go for a transition to paperless and possibly beyond. I think going paperless is probably at least 3-4 years off, if even then. We are an old organization and kind of stuck in our old ways of doing things.

FAR - 7/13 - 72, 11/13- 74, 2/14- 82!!! Best score ever (for me)!!!
BEC - 1/14 - 75!!! Perfect score! First Pass! YAY!!!
AUD - 8/14 - 80!!!
REG - 5/14 - 72, 10/14 - 66, 1/15 - 78 - DONE FOREVER!!!
I did 5 of the UNA and CPAExcel classes to earn units.

[Anonymous]

The best part about outsourcing is that you can more easily have the company scan in your old documents, too. I work for a company currently that, among other things, provides outsourced scanning services – I've seen customers who are converting send us 7 years' worth of old records which we scan and have back to them in days if not less, then on an ongoing basis we scan a box every now-and-then depending on their needs. Ironically, in the accounting department, we're personally scanning our old records, and it's taking forever.

Also it's hard to convert to paperless when all your historical records are electronic, but if you can ship off all your old records and have them available electronically in just a few days, then you can start to appreciate the benefits of paperless without having to wait till your staff has enough man hours to convert the old records (cause if you're like our office, it's an hour here or there between things, whereas for the outsourced company, it's 8 hours a day for their whole department). When your boss starts appreciating being able to see the check images over the network at home when he remembers he needed to look at something, instead of having to wait till he gets to work tomorrow and can ask your crew to hunt out the box and then 6 hours later find the right record, he'll start to realize that it's worth the money to continue.

All that being said, though, there are some decent desktop scanners. At a prior job, we had a scanner that looks like the Fi-6130 JMOR recommended and it worked quite well as long as your pages were all 8.5×11 or less and neatly arranged. We used it for scanning in customer's tax return backup and it worked for most of their documents – just things like Soc Sec statements that were odd sizes or lots of little receipts had to be copied before scanning.

[StephAV]

I just ordered the 7160… Hopefully it works for us. Ideally we'd be scanning dues batches which would alternate full sheet invoice to checks which vary in size… I'm nervous now that it won't work out. I just spent $1k. Even if we just scanned the checks there are different sizes. Most personal checks are smaller than business checks which are generally 1/3 of a page.

I think I might recommend that outsourcing to my mom. She is the CFO of a car dealership group and they just went paperless, she had my little sister work there full time all summer trying to get the scanning caught up. No one wants to do it. Sounds kind of like my copying dilemma.

FAR - 7/13 - 72, 11/13- 74, 2/14- 82!!! Best score ever (for me)!!!
BEC - 1/14 - 75!!! Perfect score! First Pass! YAY!!!
AUD - 8/14 - 80!!!
REG - 5/14 - 72, 10/14 - 66, 1/15 - 78 - DONE FOREVER!!!
I did 5 of the UNA and CPAExcel classes to earn units.

[StephAV]

I just ordered the 7160… Hopefully it works for us. Ideally we'd be scanning dues batches which would alternate full sheet invoice to checks which vary in size… I'm nervous now that it won't work out. I just spent $1k. Even if we just scanned the checks there are different sizes. Most personal checks are smaller than business checks which are generally 1/3 of a page.

I think I might recommend that outsourcing to my mom. She is the CFO of a car dealership group and they just went paperless, she had my little sister work there full time all summer trying to get the scanning caught up. No one wants to do it. Sounds kind of like my copying dilemma.

FAR - 7/13 - 72, 11/13- 74, 2/14- 82!!! Best score ever (for me)!!!
BEC - 1/14 - 75!!! Perfect score! First Pass! YAY!!!
AUD - 8/14 - 80!!!
REG - 5/14 - 72, 10/14 - 66, 1/15 - 78 - DONE FOREVER!!!
I did 5 of the UNA and CPAExcel classes to earn units.

[Anonymous]

Steph, I think you'll be fine with the checks, as long as they're all lined up well (like, shake it so they're all laying flat at the top of the stack). Things which are bigger than 8 1/2 x 11 are more of an issue, or if they're much smaller than checks – like a non-sticky post it would probably even work, but a Walmart receipt that's thin and long would be likely to end up partially sideways. We did a lot with things like that check size or smaller and it worked fine with the Fi6130 (or look alike), which looks similar to the 7160.

[JMOR]

Steph, no need to worry. The 7160 will scan even the tiny little gas station receipts that are like 1&1/2 inches wide. It has adjustable width. It will also do legal size paper. The 7160 is super fast too!! It should work really good for checks. If I ever have to copy checks for a client file I just use the scanner and then print them, way faster than a copy machine and better quality image too.

REG - 86
FAR - 74,
BEC - 72,
AUD -73,

[Tncincy]

I think I want to go paperless too…..I've been contemplating for a few years now. I was going to get the scanner from office max. it's supposed to scan to the program you wan to store the information. This post has been very helpful.

It begins with a 75
Been here too long as a cheerleader....ready to pass

[JMOR]

tncincy, just make sure that it is TWAIN compliant and it should work well with your document management system.

REG - 86
FAR - 74,
BEC - 72,
AUD -73,

[StephAV]

Thanks!!! Now I just can't wait for it to arrive!

FAR - 7/13 - 72, 11/13- 74, 2/14- 82!!! Best score ever (for me)!!!
BEC - 1/14 - 75!!! Perfect score! First Pass! YAY!!!
AUD - 8/14 - 80!!!
REG - 5/14 - 72, 10/14 - 66, 1/15 - 78 - DONE FOREVER!!!
I did 5 of the UNA and CPAExcel classes to earn units.

[Author]

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