Six Steps to Launch Electronic Document Management

Even before the world learned about the coronavirus disease, major companies had already switched to electronic document management, but the pandemic was the primary reason that made transition to EDM wide-scale. BDO Unicon Outsourcing experts have prepared a guide addressing the aspects to be considered by companies when implementing corporate EDM systems and depicting how EDM will contribute to business process optimization.

1. MAKE YOUR COLLEAGUES AWARE OF THE PROSPECTS ASSOCIATED WITH EDM IMPLEMENTATION

Why should you switch over to electronic document management? Some people in your company may be unaware of the reasons, and therefore, you should start by presenting the prospects to your colleagues. Tell them how EDM accelerates and facilitates the approval processes, analyze some cases. For instance, how EDM may be used to improve performance of an individual employee or entire business units: electronic system makes it possible to track a document at all approval stages, identify the department where it got stuck, and make sure that it doesn’t get lost in the pile of documents.

In case of a complex management reporting system, EDM rules out the situations when the document is stacked from one desk to another down the pipeline and sends it directly to the responsible signatories.

Besides, electronic format accelerates feedback, which is particularly important when exchanging documents with counterparties. Once EDM is in place, the officer responsible for accepting and sending correspondence will not have to describe and check such correspondence in the register, make allowances for express delivery companies’ delivery periods, as the document will be sent to the counterparty immediately upon signing and will be delivered on the same day.

Eco-friendliness is yet another benefit of electronic document management. All documents are generated and sent in the system, and thus, the company will not consume as much paper as it used to, make arrangements for record retention, and lease a lot of space for the records retention department.

2. REVIEW ALL PROCESSES IN YOUR COMPANY

Draw the diagrams depicting your company’s current document management pattern. Specifying the officers responsible for the mailing and receipt of documents, various approval stages, pattern of communication between departments and business units.

Think about the ways these algorithms may be used in the electronic format, make lists of employees involved in the document flow process and managers responsible for approval of the relevant document.

For the sake of information security, provide for an option to assign different access rights for documents and roles. If the document management process in your company involves a low number of employees and there is no need of access control, you may be satisfied with the standard set of functions offered by the provider. In this case, colleagues will be able to select the document they are responsible for and forward it down the approval pipeline on their own.

By contrast, if you have a lot of employees involved in the document management process, introduce the role of administrator responsible for assigning documents to responsible officers upon receipt. Alternatively, use additional routers that may be set up automatically to launch the approval process by default based on predetermined criteria.

3. REGISTER A DIGITAL SIGNATURE

Establish the ultimate signatory. Normally, this is the General Director of the company, as switchover to electronic document management does not add any work load to his/her duties — he/she will receive and sign the document as before.

However, this role may be assigned to an authorized representative under power of attorney. You will need to obtain a digital signature certificate for this person in the qualified certification authority, as this is necessary to ensure due process for electronic documents.

It is enough to register one encrypted and certified digital signature for the company.

4. SELECT THE PROVIDER AND IDENTIFY THE APPROPRIATE DATA INTEGRATION METHOD

There are multiple companies offering EDM set-up and support services in the market. Check your counterparty for reliability (frequency of information security audits) and make sure that your records will be retained for unlimited time, even after the certificate expires, to secure continuous access thereto.

Identify your company’s objectives and document management scope, as this will affect the price and choice of tariff. Is it enough for you to receive documents in the system, or do you want to be able to send them as well?

Check the appropriate processing solution for electronic documents. You may use an app in the browser or integrate a dedicated module in your primary accounting system (e.g. 1C or SAP) in order to upload / download documents to / from the system directly.

Please note that in order to set up document exchange between customers of different providers, you will need to set up roaming. This service is free, but you will have to factor in the time required to set it up.

5. PREPARE INSTRUCTIONS FOR EMPLOYEES

The higher the number of company employees involved in the document management process, the more questions about the new format you may receive in the beginning. Take effort to prepare straightforward and detailed instructions to make your colleagues’ life easier. For instance, specify:

• The person responsible for assigning documents;

• The company employees’ and managers’ tasks;

• The company’s approval chains;

• The person responsible for placing the document in electronic archive.

You may prepare video guides for the system and break down the tasks by roles, positions, and business units in order to avoid mistakes.

6. MAKE ARRANGEMENTS WITH YOUR COUNTERPARTIES

To set up electronic document management with your counterparties, review the by-laws and document the new delivery method. There are three ways to agree on switchover to electronic exchange.

1. Drawing up an addendum to an existing agreement in two hard copies specifying the date when the companies will launch document exchange via electronic data links. Each copy must be signed, sealed, and exchanged with the counterparty. This is the safest method in legal terms.

2. Drawing up a similar addendum and signing it via electronic document management.

3. Sending a notice of switchover to electronic document management to the counterparty and switching over to electronic exchange of documents with the counterparty following acceptance of the invitation. This is the most contestable option from the legal perspective, but certain customers prefer it for its simplicity as compared to the other methods.

Source: Klerk