The storage, retention and accessibility of information within a business are critical to its efficiency and will ultimately determine the speed at which an organisation responds to demands placed upon it. Nowadays, organisations need to effectively and securely manage a variety of documents including; general communications, such as letters, memos and emails, and more specialised documents, such as CAD drawings and designs.
The Document Management module is found under the Administration section of the EFACS E/8 software, and it acts as an archive to provide quick, easy and effective access to information. This is done in a secure, controlled and traceable manner.
The Document Management module contains many different document types such as:
- Legal documents – contracts, specifications and quality standards.
- Written communications – letters, memos and emails.
- Images – drawings and other images.
The module supports a wide range of formats, such as:
- Microsoft documents – Word and Excel
- Video files
- Sound files
- Images – JPG, MPG, GIF, etc.
- CAD formats – DXF and DWG
In fact, all formats are supported within a web browser.
The module features greater functionality than exclusively storing and viewing the documents stored within. The software allows the user to interact and amend the documents from within the Document Management module.
Document Attributes:
When a document is created, each document has user defined attributes, some of which are mandatory while others are optional. This allows key information to be stored against each document.
An example of this would be:
A document is created to capture information regarding an upcoming Purchase Order. The user can define mandatory attributes, in this case it would be Customer, Sales Order and Sender. This ensures that all this information has to be filled in. An optional attribute could be Project, this would mean that all Purchase Orders that are connected to a Project are fulfilled against that Project.
If there is an incoming electronic Purchase Order, a user can also “drag and drop” the Purchase Order from their desktop into EFACS, which creates the Purchase Order as a new EFACS document. This new EFACS document will be available immediately from within the EFACS software. The new document will be linked to the relevant Customer or Sales Order.
Document Revisions:
A document can be revised numerous times within the module, each time the document is revised, the history of changes is recorded, leaving a paper trail of the previous versions of the document. These revised documents can be viewed through a user friendly preview interface.
EFACS Workflows allows all documents to be circulated to all relevant users. Each user has the option to revise the document. Each time the document is revised, there are notes held against each revision. All finished and approved documents will be available through the Documents tab. Users can also access the previous versions of the document in this tab.
The software is browser based, meaning that users will have access to all documents as long as they have access to an Internet enabled device. This enables users to capture, submit, author, convert, share and find documents wherever they are.
Integration Capabilities:
The Document Management module is linked directly to the Workflow module, this allows for documents to be automatically filed and approved via tasks containing embedded documents.
The Document Management module also allows for communication outside of the business or organisation. Communication Tracking allows the user to send emails to customers and suppliers with all relevant documents and files associated attached to the email.
Documents, such as quotations, specifications and sales agreements, can be automatically attached to a supplier email by utilising the multiple referencing tools. All communications, incoming and outgoing, are logged within the Communications tab in order to easily access them for future reference. Any attachments that come in as part of an email are stored as documents.
Document Gallery:
The Gallery allows you to view documents including any CAD drawings and embedded videos.
Multiple References:
EFACS Document Management uses the “attach once, reference many times” approach. This allows all documents that are managed by EFACS to be referenced against any number of records. The user can view each document and its associated references within the Multiple References tab.
An example of this would be a document can be referenced against a collection of parts, as well as customers, suppliers and any other type of record that is specific as an associated document reference.
EFACS allows the user to create a link between documents and any number of references. This ensures quick management of all documents held within the organisation.
Benefits for your Business:
- Documents are easy to access for users and so time is better utilised.
- Improved retrieval time when sourcing internal information.
- Reduces cost of printing and paper.
- Easier to distribute important documents to all relevant users.
- Full history of all documents and revisions are available within the module.
- Speed up business processes and enhance their quality.
- Document security provides better disaster recovery.
To learn more about other elements of the EFACS software, check out some of our other Spotlight Series blogs!
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