The digitization of documents is the direct translation of a document on a hard medium (it can be paper documents as well as audio-video recordings on suitable media) into certain computer code, which is then available for display, editing or copying.
What is document digitization?
In the age of high technology and rapid technological advancement, when digital technologies cover more and more areas of human activity, from finance to space, it is absolutely logical to take full advantage of the digital format in business documents. More and more companies are recognizing the effectiveness of digitizing all of their documentation.
This process complicates the work with documents and minimizes the benefits of using electronic document management systems. Ideally, the document should be created in electronic form, certified with an electronic digital signature and transmitted over networks in electronic format. And the recipient of the document must be able to verify the authenticity of the digital signature. And it is such an electronic document that is legally significant due to the use, which is practically equivalent to a handwritten signature, subject to the following conditions.
Key Benefits of Document Digitization
Of course, the process of digitizing documents is not free and requires certain material costs (for example, top vdr providers have a fairly high price tag for services), but they pay off with a wide list of advantages of this innovation:
- Firstly, the load on various paper archives and on the photocopying area in particular is significantly reduced. Thus, if several employees of the organization need one document at the same time, it is not at all necessary to photocopy it.
- Secondly, the digitization of documents guarantees a significant reduction in the cost of maintaining a paper archive, as well as the release of some area that was previously used for storing paper archives.
In addition, digitization of documents contributes to a significant increase in the level of productivity and labor efficiency of employees of a particular company. It provides high-quality control over all stages of using various kinds of information. By the way, the possibility of a certain restriction of access to documentation by setting special access codes for employees of different levels). And round-the-clock access to all data guarantees a comfortable and highly productive work or educational process.
Inconvenience of paper documents
So, in large archives, it is very often necessary to spend a lot of time and effort to find the required document. In addition, the most frequently used documents over time can be damaged or even “lost” if they are mistakenly placed in the archive. Often, in any type of business, there are situations when high efficiency in providing information is required: sometimes you need to quickly prepare documents for signing, make paper or digital copies, and accurately stitch them – when working with paper archives, efficiency is lost.
This is not a complete list of the inconveniences that one has to face when working with paper archives. But at the same time, there is a fairly simple and elegant way to solve the problem – the digitization of documents.
What documents can be digitized?
The development of computer technology makes it possible to digitize almost everything. Any document on a solid medium, whether it be a paper document, photograph, slide, book, magazine, etc. can be digitized. Moreover, video recording on obsolete media, such as magnetic or film, is perfectly amenable to digitization. The same applies to audio recordings.