Transcript Document Imaging and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) alive in VisualRATEX Tuesday, August 2nd, 2:30 – 3:30pm By Thomas Romantic, Cornell Business Services & Jere.

Document Imaging and Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) alive in VisualRATEX
Tuesday, August 2nd, 2:30 – 3:30pm
By Thomas Romantic, Cornell Business Services
& Jere Warner, Ratex Business Solutions
Questions
Document Imaging and Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) alive in VisualRATEX
2:30-3:30
Attend this session to learn how your school can use
Document Imaging tools in VR to view actual invoices,
course requests and other important documents with one
click of the mouse. We will also demonstrate the birth of
the new CRM application that is being developed in VR.
Alto Database Integration
AP.TF and TX.CRF
Digital Storage
The Idea
Scan all of the store invoices into an
electronic repository in order to eliminate
time-consuming filing and make them
easily accessible to all store staff.
The Process
In fall 2004 we began work on this project. With the vendor, Alto
imaging Technologies Inc., that developed the systems we use to
store and retrieve scanned articles for custom coursepacks, we
discussed applying this technology to solve one of the labor
intensive administrative functions in our business. We receive
approximately 25,000 invoices each year. The processes of filing
them, and then of retrieving them when questions arise have been
time consuming and inefficient.
The Process
The initial development took just a few weeks, and additional
features were added later. We were able to use equipment and
hardware we already had, although we did choose to buy a new
server and we needed to acquire an additional license for the
software.
The equipment requirements are:
– Standard server running Windows Server 2003
(can be obtained for approx $2000)
– UltraDoc software from Alto (contact RBS)
– Scanner (prices for scanners range from $100 - $6000)
The Process
We began with invoices for this fiscal year, which started July 1,
2004. We first loaded the metadata, which is the log of every
transaction, and then scanned each invoice in order to attach the
image files to the metadata. It took several months to scan the
invoices dating back to July 1. Student employees assisted with
preparing the invoices for scanning (removing staples, etc.) and
scanning is done by members of the store operations team when
they can flex from the sales floor to the office.
Daily Maintenance
Now that the repository is in place, the metadata is updated every
night based on new invoices and credit memos that our business
office has entered in RATEX. The following morning we scan the
paper invoices and attach the image files to the metadata. This
takes 45 minutes to one hour each morning.
Features
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Usage is view-only (except for one or two users who have
administrative’ privileges)
The data attributes displayed can be customized by user
Full-text searching… e.g. by name of company, or name of
product
Images saved as TIF files…. Can be printed, or can be emailed as an
attachment and then viewed with the Microsoft TIF viewer that is now
standard in Office.
The database is tied into Visual RATEX so that users can link directly
from RATEX to the appropriate image file
Results
Our buyers and accounting staff are extremely pleased. The
retrieval of information for verifying pricing and answering
questions is almost instantaneous. The time savings from filing
alone nets to over 15 hours per month. (We were spending
approximately 30 hours per month filing invoices. Scanning them
takes just 15 hours per month.)
Results
The space savings have also been dramatic. We used to keep
approximately 64 linear feet of filing capacity in our business office.
After one year the invoices were moved to banker’s boxes in our
warehouse. We’ve had to retain 24 banker’s boxes per year for 7
years. After invoices are scanned they now go directly to banker’s
offices, so we’ve eliminated the need for file space. The university
is currently revising its retention policy; it’s possible that if
electronic versions are available, we will not need to retain the
paper copies at all in the future.
Results
We are also discovering new uses, now that data on invoices is so
accessible. For example, UPS invoices include credits for missed
delivery times, based on Z number, so we can search by Z number
in order to refund customers’ payments for expedited shipment. A
second example is better freight monitoring, to see if the method
we requested was used.
CRM Applications
Customer Email
Notifications
Faculty Database
Live
Examples
Live Examples
Thank You!
Tom ([email protected]) / Jere ([email protected])
Thank You!