Why Your Firm Should Go Paperless: 4 Reasons You Didn’t Consider

Let’s not dwell on the number of times you’ve been reminded that removing the paper from your firm will save you time, space and money. This is a universally acknowledged truth that hardly needs any more exposure to be recognised (and if you’ve been asleep for the last 15 years, you can learn more about this here). But what are the benefits of going paperless that you hadn’t considered?

1. Reduced risk and enhanced security

Going paperless can put you in an excellent position from a risk management perspective. Comprehensive and systematic record keeping reduces professional indemnity risk as a result of firm-wide, centralised filing of emails and file notes as well as ‘audit trail’ functions that provide an automated record of a particular document’s history (including creation, editing and approvals processes).

A secure online portal that both you and your clients can access drastically reduces the risks associated with sending confidential and private information via email or regular mail.

Think about the way your staff works today – could they continue to meet their work obligations if they could not access your office? The absence of physical documents makes your firm’s informationmuch easier to recover in the event of a disaster. It’s far easier to pick up a hard drive then a filing cabinet.

 2. Enabling a truly mobile workforce

Going paperless is essential if you want to be a part of the modern workforce revolution. The world is changing and businesses don’t run like they used to: technology now allows us the freedom of employing stay-at-home mums, international specialists on contract positions, or a whole team of staff in another country. In order for your staff to work effectively remotely, they need to be able to access all job-related information, templates and records – all of which is possible when the documents are centrally stored within an electronic document management system, whether online or offline.

 3. A more valuable and saleable business

A systemised firm with best practice paperless processes and technologies will attract a higher valuation because such systems allow a smoother transition to any new owner. It also makes any purchaser due diligence process easier for the vendor, as they should have simple, fast access to all documents the prospective purchaser may wish to review.