Thanks to recent advances in scanning technologies, storing documents has perhaps never been easier.
While document storage used to consist of stacking piles of pages in boxes, paying for a storage unit, and then transporting those boxes back and forth, now you can simply digitize those documents by scanning them, and then store them digitally in a number of different ways.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with document scanning, read on to find out more about the best ways to scan documents for storage.
While most people picture physical pieces of hardware when they think about document scanning, it’s becoming increasingly popular to use software solutions to this end.
One solution is Adobe Acrobat, which can also perform OCR (or optical character recognition,) meaning you can then search for words and phrases within the document. Software solutions are advancing at an impressive rate, with some modern phones coming with OCR capabilities. It’s definitely worth considering it as an option, especially if your documents are of high quality and low in number.
Your documents need to be scanned in order to be converted to digital format, but despite flatbed scanners' versatility, the need to open the lid and manually replace or flip each page in order to scan a file makes it a slow, laborious process.
Also, the pace at which the light moves across the glass bed of a flatbed scanner is restricted, reducing the overall speed of the scanning process.
As a result, a scanner with an Automatic Document Feeder is preferable when scanning multi-page documents. With most options, there is a paper tray that moves, in order to draw each sheet across a lamp, thereby significantly accelerating the scanning process.
If your documents are double-sided and you only have a traditional ADF tray in your scanner, you’ll need to get a tray that’s capable of duplexing.
These trays use rollers to flip each document, allowing the scanner to take copies of each side before moving on to the next sheet. If you already have a high-quality scanner, this might be a cost-effective solution in your situation.
While you can scan the documents yourself using one of the technologies listed in this article, it’s often a good idea to use professional document scanning services. This is especially the case if the documents that you need scanning are delicate, or if you need a large number of documents scanned.
A professional scanning service will be able to use their expertise to ensure that the documents are scanned using the most effective and efficient method available, ensuring that the digital copies are of the highest quality possible without damaging the originals.
https://www.pearl-scan.co.uk/scanning-services/document-scanning/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/technology/personaltech/digitizing-important-documents.html
