Paper will have a big impact on your business processes even in the digital age. However, your paper documents are just as vulnerable to harm as your digital information.
The top three risks to be aware of:
Risk 1: Major catastrophes
Your paper documents will be gone if your office burns down. Important business documents can also potentially be lost as a result of flood, mold, mildew, and possibly a pest infestation if they are stored in your office or in a storage unit. Please be aware, the majority of business filing cabinets are neither watertight nor fireproof. Most likely, you won’t have the time and resources to gather all of your organization’s crucial information, even if you have forewarning of an impending disaster.
For the sake of safeguarding papers from disastrous situations, off-site storage is essential. Paper records are protected from fires, floods, and other natural calamities by professional records storage facilities. Look for a facility that satisfies National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA) when selecting a professional records storage provider:
- Strict protocols for access control
- Digital monitoring
- Fire detection technologies
By keeping your documents off-site, you are protecting them from potentially disastrous events that might occur at your main place of business.
Risk 2: Information management
Confidential information may be lost, misused, or stolen if paper documents are stored internally. Think about how your company now handles file management. It’s likely that there isn’t just one person in charge of managing file access and retrieval. A document is ultimately out of your control the moment it leaves your possession. This document’s loss, misplacement, or theft could have a significant negative effect on your company, including the following:
- Customer churn
- Financial setback
- Noncompliance with regulations
- Legal responsibility
Your papers can be appropriately managed with the help of a competent records storage company. With the use of an inventory management system, files are barcoded and tracked. You can view the quantity and types of documents you keep, the owners of each file, and their locations via secure web access. In the event that a file is required, it is retrieved from the designated storage location and either given by hand to the requestor or supplied to them electronically via a Scan on Demand service.
Risk 3: Improper disposal of documents
Identity theft and commercial fraud must be prevented and shredding of paper is essential. However, because it takes so many steps and so much time, your staff can be persuaded to forgo shredding and simply place documents in the recycle bin. The process doesn’t end with running paper through the office shredder. These actions are also necessary:
- Taking out the binders, rubber bands, clips, and staples
- Dividing up documents for straightforward destruction
- Removing a paper jam
- Emptying the shredder bin
- A minute of lost productivity is equal to each minute spent using an office shredder
The good news is that using a scheduled shredding service speeds up the destruction of documents and guarantees that all of your private data is destroyed. This is how it goes:
- All across your office are locked shredding containers.
- A container is filled with entire files that are still attached with paper clips, staples, sticky notes, and folders.
- The containers are emptied by a qualified shredding expert according to a schedule you establish, and they are either destroyed on-site at your office or off-site at a shredding factory.
- Strict chain of custody guidelines and a Certificate of Destruction are included in both on-site and off-site shredding techniques for your records.
Request an estimate on our website or by calling 860-627-5800 to learn more. Our experts will ask you a few questions to better understand your requirements, after which they will tell you exactly what to expect from start to finish, including the cost.
