Document capture software takes paper and inbound files and turns them into numbered, filed, searchable documents, and the right one for a small firm depends on three numbers the firm rarely writes down: the backlog in boxes, the pages arriving each working day, and the hours a week spent finding paper by hand. Buy for a brochure and the firm ends up with a workflow engine it never configures; buy for the load and a scanner, a filing rule and a portal usually cover it. The free document capture worksheet on this site prints the backlog pages, the scanner hours to clear them, the daily scanning minutes and the retrieval cost from your own counts, so the software is chosen against the job it will actually do.
The backlog decides the first month
Twelve boxes at the worksheet's default of 2,500 pages is thirty thousand pages, and at forty pages a minute that is twelve and a half hours of scanning: a week of afternoons, not a project. The worksheet takes your box count and your scanner's real speed, halved if the documents need staples pulled and sizes sorted, and prints the hours, so the first month is planned rather than dreaded.
The daily load decides the software
A hundred and fifty pages a day is under four minutes of scanning on the same scanner, so the software's job is not speed, it is filing on arrival: the client, the matter, the Bates number and the retention date set the moment the page lands. Software that captures fast and files into an inbox folder has recreated the shared drive with a scanner attached. Batesio Pro numbers and files on capture.
The retrieval time is the number that pays for it
Twenty paper lookups a day at five minutes each is eight hours a week, and at thirty dollars an hour twelve and a half thousand dollars a year walking to the cabinet. Dropbox, cited below, prices its Standard team plan at $15 per user per month; the drive is not where the money goes, the retrieval is, and the worksheet prints the figure so the capture project is judged against it.
Questions people ask about document capture software
Is there free document capture software?
The worksheet on this site sizes the capture project free with no account: backlog, scan hours, daily minutes, retrieval cost and retention load. Batesio Pro is the system that holds what you capture: the portal, the numbering and the retention record.
What scanner speed should a small firm assume?
The rated pages per minute of the scanner, halved for stapled, mixed-size or double-sided documents that need preparation. The worksheet takes the figure as an input so both cases can be compared.
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