Watch the video or read the article here:

Let’s talk about the role of advanced capture in today’s complex application and business processing environment and delve into how Parascript advanced capture brings value beyond the capture operation and actually provides efficiency increases and cost savings in other business areas without even touching them.

Facing the Challenges

Major businesses today are faced with significant issues when it comes to governance, compliance and records management. Add the specter of GDPR to the conversation and all of a sudden you have a real discussion going on. ECM technology has evolved over the last 30 years, and corporations have had to evolve with it. Unfortunately, that evolution was largely add-on or siloed deployments of the latest hot ticket capability within a department or acquired through merger and acquisition activities.

Little thought was given back then to the ultimate management of corporate data and intellectual property at the macro level. Think about how many physical and electronic storage areas you have in your enterprise and how many copies of the same artifact. If you’re lucky, they are named the same both in the form of metadata labels and in the database, but we know that isn’t often the case.

Grappling with Multiple ECM Platforms and Repositories

It’s fairly common for companies to have several ECM and line of business repositories. According to AIIM, over 75% of businesses have multiple ECM platforms often in excess of 10, which include all the complication and management issues that entails. It’s very expensive to level set corporate intellectual property from a governance standpoint, not to mention doing so does nothing for operational efficiency. The real problem is that the effort is pure cost and provides only risk mitigation. It does nothing to proactively advance the bottom line of the company.

Having departments that interact with each other, create shared content and documents and leverage different repository creates issues in all sorts of areas including security, standardization, records management, capturing metadata as well as backup and disaster recovery. This is not the exception. This is the norm.

Parallels in Capture Technology

Along this same timeline, many of today’s capture systems grew in capability through merger and acquisition, which means the code base became cumbersome. Maintenance and upgrades got more complex and harder to maintain, and cost performance actually went down in some cases.

AI and Machine Learning

Using artificial intelligence, pattern recognition, machine learning techniques and image analysis technology, Parascript was able to solve complex business problems for postal services, US Federal financial and government institutions as well as private institutions through the automation of signature verification and fraud detection in handwriting analysis. Not only that, Parascript is its own OCR engine. It is a single technology stack and doesn’t rely on third-party OCR providers. This gives us much greater control and flexibility with our software platform.

We hear terms like artificial intelligence, deep machine learning and neural networks being thrown around the industry today like it’s a new thing. Parascript is not moving in that direction. We started there.

We hear terms like artificial intelligence, deep machine learning and neural networks being thrown around the industry today like it’s a new thing. Parascript is not moving in that direction. We started there. So, what does that mean, and where do we go from here?

Facilitating Successful Projects

Facilitating successful IT projects in today’s world is all about resource optimization and forced multiplication. Simply stated, businesses want more bang for the buck. 75% to 90% of all scanning applications are batch oriented. We define batch capture as the use of batch cover sheets, barcoded separator sheets and keying from image indexing practices.

This can be optimized and significant savings recovered, but as the existing processes are running smoothly and without issue, those saving potentials go largely unnoticed since companies are typically reactive or crisis-oriented with respect to daily management. It’s the quintessential forest and trees in reverse. This means that literally any batch capture operation has significant opportunity for improvement.

Our premise is to leverage existing pathways, tribal knowledge and procedures.

Achieving Digital Transformation

Don’t compete with the status quo, make it work better for you. Increase capability from existing hardware platforms and digital plumbing. MFPs can be so much more than a simple document on-ramp. They can literally be turned into advanced capture facilitation platforms, de-skilling the process, increasing throughput and maximizing existing investment. The same Parascript FormXtra.AI capture platform used for daily transactional business processes can be used to facilitate legacy migration, metadata correction, data normalization and records management assignment.

This literally facilitates and achieves digital transformation.

Typical Capture Workflow Process

The classic capture/workflow process has customers and vendors sending business transactions into capture via snail mail, email, fax, etc. In the batch capture process people sort, prep, scan & index these transactions that are then released to workflow. Any batch capture related errors are dealt with in the first step of workflow. Mismatched documents, poorly prepped batches or indexing errors results in extraneous work requirements in order to perfect the document or transaction to the point that can be processed in workflow. Industry standards puts the error correction requirement at 15 to 20 times the level of effort to process a normal transaction. Batch capture error rates due to normal operational conditions range in the area of 7% – 10% of total transactions or documents.

Even the best data entry operator makes mistakes. Statistics indicate that a minimum one in 67 characters will be keyed incorrectly.

The 1:10:100 Rule

What is the resulting effect on us? It means that one in eight social security numbers will be entered incorrectly. One in 10 invoices will be keyed in error and that means extra effort. Are you familiar with the 1:10:100 rule used to quantify the hidden costs of poor quality?

The 1:10:100 rule can be applied in many scenarios concerned with production and the cost of correction. It can mean any number of units measured in financial terms or level of effort. If it takes one unit of work to facilitate a transaction or prevent an error, it will take 10 units to correct it when discovered in mid-process. If the item makes it all the way through the process and fails, it could take 100 times the level of effort to correct it. We can also use the 1:10:100 rule to measure cost in terms of resources or time. For our purposes, the 1:10:100 rule can be applied to data quality challenges at various stages of the document management and workflow process. We use this to help quantify the cost of errors.

Between Batch Capture and Workflow

By inserting Parascript between the current batch capture process and workflow, you reduce cost and complexity. The document processing cycle gains increased velocity and accuracy, provides more points of acquisition and reduces errors due to batch capture.

Simply stated: We process a lot more documents faster, using fewer people producing less errors.

More importantly, with our new machine self-learning capability, you can do this with very little change to the existing business process. No help desk scripts or process changes are required for the customer, vendor or workflow. No re-training on either side of the process, merely a reduction of cost and complexity in the capture area. You can literally do this behind the curtain, so to speak. No major project teams, drawn-out discovery or drama is required, and conversion/migration is a breeze.

Parascript FormXtra.AI improves workflow performance with no investment, change or cost to the workflow process. By processing more documents faster with fewer people and producing less capture based errors submitted to workflow, we provide additional value beyond the capture function.

Direct Labor and Downstream Savings

This means we will create direct labor savings in downstream process areas we feed and are typically the bigger piece of the pie. Why is that important? We create increased cash flow. Another way to think about it is: the project is self-funding. So how do we do that?

In front of every business process or workflow model? The very first branch out of the capture and the logic model is can the item be worked? Is the artifact or transaction complete and correct? Yes or no? If yes, it goes straight into the workflow. If not, it goes into what I call the 12-step program. Is it a document error? Is it an AP document in HR, a shipping document in contracts? Is it a data error? Examples include values that don’t match or wrong vendor for the P.O. and so on.

The 1:10:100 rule takes these hidden costs even further.

Industry standards say that it can take 15 to 20 times the level of effort to correct a defective item as it does to process one straight through. The 1:10:100 rule takes this even further. Let’s look at that consequence of errors mathematically.

Hidden in the Midst of Normal

Often time’s obvious things are hidden in the midst of “normal” and go unnoticed. Industry experts will tell you that a well-organized capture operation can return anywhere from 7%-10% errors into workflow due to human error. A 5% error rate is typically well within operationally accepted norms. The dashboard will be green; no alarms are going off. So, no scrutiny is provided or given, but what does a 5% error rate mean in terms of cost and potential opportunity?

Increases in Overall Business Efficiency

Now, you may think you have a pretty hot shop with only a 5% error rate. And you would be right under normal circumstances and current measurements. But what’s the opportunity and potential? If we could reduce the error rate by half and Parascript FormXtra.AI can, it means we could achieve a 20% increase in workflow productivity and efficiency without even touching it.

What would a 20%-30% increase in overall business process efficiency mean to you?

Parascript and our partners are more than happy to explore this opportunity with you. I hope this has been helpful. If you would like to get more details on Parascript or engage in an environmental analysis and opportunity assessment, contact us at [email protected] and we are happy to help you explore your opportunity and potential.

We have extensive online presence with our Parascript University channel on YouTube and the Parascript library where you can find and see many product videos, case studies and industry applications.