Companies strive to create “paperless offices” and reduce paper usage not only for environmental reasons, but also for economic ones. However, this is easier said than done. Reducing paper is difficult mainly because employees are used to traditional documentation.
Fortunately, technology and automation come to the rescue.
Did you know that the United States alone consumes 30% (1) of global paper production (while accounting for less than 5% of the world’s population)? For every dollar spent on printing documents, companies spend an additional $6 (2) on handling and distribution. As many as 84% of companies that implemented a “paperless” policy reported ROI within less than 18 months (3).
Legal and finance departments consume the most paper, followed by HR. The main reason companies remain “stuck in paper” is… lack of management initiative and habit of reading traditional documents.
Organizing work so that you don’t need to print is not easy—but it is possible. The key is to provide a convenient alternative that makes no one want to go back to paper.
How business applications replace paper
Thanks to business applications, you can organize processes in a way that eliminates the need for paper. Clients of Qalcwise successfully move manually managed processes into applications, creating fully paperless offices (e.g. travel requests, financial reports, invoices, surveys, and settlement documents).
Employees quickly realize that working without paper is more convenient—they no longer need to manually re-enter data, copy documents, or send them via email. They perform all tasks in one place by logging into the Qalcwise platform via a browser or mobile device.
Do you know you don’t have to store paper copies?
There are two ways to eliminate them:
- Generate a PDF summary in the application as the final step of the process.
The file is delivered to the finance department along with scanned original documents. - Request an interpretation from the tax office regarding whether digital images of documents (that cannot be modified) are sufficient for audit purposes. In most cases, the interpretation is positive.
Both approaches significantly speed up, simplify, and increase transparency in the settlement process.
Benefits of cloud business applications
Using cloud-based business applications reduces paper consumption, costs, and processing time. All employees can:
- modify documents online
- fill out forms and requests
- report expenses by scanning receipts instead of photocopying them
Applications also shorten approval times—electronic workflows significantly streamline document processing.
Solutions from Qalcwise can reduce process handling time by up to 90%!