Recent conversations with HR staff suggest that one of the most time consuming jobs within their role is manually filling and searching through paper records, to retrieve key information.

Paperwork can often get lost or misplaced, which can be a real risk for HR documents. Businesses are legally obliged under the Data Protection Act to ensure paperwork is protected in a secure environment. For those of you who are unsure about retention periods for HR documents, this is governed by UK legislation, and statutory retention information is featured in a helpful table on the CIPD website.

Having HR documents scanned and digitally indexed provides multiple benefits:-

• Access to digital information can be restricted to specific employees in your team.
   
• Data can be retrieved quickly and efficiently, allowing staff to access HR records, as and when they need them.
   

• Scanned images can be stored in a cloud HR document management solution, providing flexible access from any location as well as an electronic audit trail for your information.

• Scanning HR records such as leavers’ files, holiday records, application forms, time sheets and sickness/absence records can provide businesses with a far more flexible and efficient process, compared with manual filing.

• Converting documents into digital format can save huge amounts of money, as well as valuable office space and staff time.

What is the scanning and data capture process?

Your confidential and sensitive paperwork can be digitised and high volumes of HR records converted quickly and easily.  Intelligent data capture software can be utilised to automatically index information from your documents, such as employee number, date of birth, surname or location.  

This reduces manual data entry and increases the accuracy of your data.  Once digitally indexed,  employee records can be searched using a simple keyword function.

Digital data can be output to any required format, to enable information to be accessed from existing office systems.  Commonly data is stored on USB, CD or DVD. Many companies opt for return via secure FTP and cloud document management is also becoming increasing popular.

Manage HR Records In The Cloud

Cloud Document Management allows HR departments to store information securely, whilst allowing staff to access documents from any location using a web browser. This enables multiple offices to access information from anywhere.  Users can share notes and assign tasks/documents to other users.

Cloud solutions can automate HR processes for example approval of holiday forms, using workflow  to route the form to the correct person within the organisation.