eBridge Solutions Blog

Turning Regulatory Compliance Into A Business Advantage

No one wants to hear from their boss, CPA or attorney that they need to adhere to industry, state or even federal regulations or risk penalties. It's more red tape. More aggravation. And, let's face it, more work.

But, there are times when making an investment to tighten up your compliance gaps can actually improve the overall efficiency of your business. Especially when it comes to managing your records.

A document management and retention policy that follows best practices in your industry and meets regulatory requirements (HIPAA, SOX, GLB, The Patriot Act and more) has many benefits that translate beyond just compliance, including:

• Avoiding legal landmines. If you are ever called to court, having copies (date and time stamped, even) of important records could be enough to keep you from paying big fines or - worst-case scenario - going to jail.
• Improving customer service. Access to electronic documents, enables you and your staff can quickly and easily answer customer questions. No more digging for files or copies of invoices.
• Increasing employee morale. Not having to dig for files will make your employees MUCH happier. So will clean desks and being able to work from home occasionally.
• Lowering overall cost of doing business. By converting paper documents to digital files as part of your record retention strategy, you'll be able to reduce the need for paper, toner and other office supplies. You can also cut back on postage, couriers and overnight delivery services and reduce or eliminate on and off-site storage.
• Reducing security risk. Digital documents can be password protected and encrypted. It's much harder for files to end up in the dumpster behind your office if they aren't in paper format.
• Creating a disaster-recovery backup. Digital documents stored in the cloud can be accessed any time, anywhere. So, if your office burns to the ground or is inaccessible for a period of time, you can still conduct business. Not so if your file cabinets are six feet under water.
• Reducing need for in-house IT, servers and support. If your digital documents are entrusted to a professional hosted document management provider, you simplify the work for your IT staff, and eliminate the expense of servers or technical support. Someone else will do that for you.

By going paperless, you'll be meeting more of your regulatory requirements AND you'll realize some additional benefits that will make your business run more efficiently and cost-effectively. In this economy, being more nimble and streamlined could be the business advantage you need to be more successful than your competition.

Reason #8 to love document management: eliminate couriers!

eBridge Solutions' web-based document management system is the most efficient way to share documents with your customers. Reason #8 to love eBridge Solutions: Let your customers scan documents into your electronic file cabinet and eliminate couriers.

By putting your trust in eBridge, you know your important documents are in safe hands. Your customer scans in their documents that you can then pull up in your own secure electronic file cabinet. This ensures your documents won't end up in the wrong hands, they won't get lost in the mail or accidently taken from the fax machine.

Even waiting just 24 hours for an important document to be delivered can feel like an eternity, by scanning your documents directly into eBridge you no longer have that down time waiting for the courier, overnight delivery service or snail mail. Once a client scans their document into their file cabinet, it will be available to you in mere seconds.

On top of all of that, eliminating couriers with document management will save you hundreds, if not THOUSANDS, of dollars a year. For one low monthly fee with eBridge Solutions you will reduce the amount of paper products you buy, virtually eliminate all postage, photocopies, fax machine and off-site storage.

It doesn't get much better than that. Visit eBridgeSolutions.com for more information and contact a sales representative today. Say 'Bye Bye!' to your courier and 'Hello!' to savings! 

Reason # 2 to love eBridge Solutions: Access your data 24/7, 365 days a year!

Whether you're hard at work in the office on a Wednesday, catching up on some work at home on a Sunday night or you have to find a certain file when the office is closed for a holiday, with eBridge Solutions, your documents are always accessible no matter where you are or what time it is.   

The web-based feature makes eBridge the perfect solution for the workaholic, the traveler and all those weekend warriors who are "just trying to catch up". It can save employers time (why go to the office if you don't need to?) and money (documents don't need to be mailed or couriered to off-site employees). It can also increase the levels of service your business provides.

Several of the industries eBridge deals with REALLY benefit from this any time, anywhere access - funeral directors and realtors. Think of it (sad as it may be): a funeral director gets a call at 3 a.m. from a family who has lost their loved one. Instead of having to go into the office and find out whether the person wanted to be buried or cremated, the director can log into their online file cabinet and pull up the pre-arrangement paperwork.

Or, in a happier example, a realtor who gets a call at 8 p.m. from a seller who has accepted an offer can open their file cabinet and e-mail the acceptance letter to the buyer instead of running to the office.  

As long as you have access to a computer and the Internet, eBridge Solutions is anywhere you want (or need) to be.

Reason #47: Need to add remote employees? eBridge makes it easy!

There are several benefits to adding remote employees to your staff. And while the idea might be overwhelming at first, eBridge Solutions would like to help make it a little easier for you. 

If you are thinking about hiring remote employees but aren't quite sure if it's feasible for your company, let me share some of the benefits.

First, the average cost of housing an employee in your office is anywhere from 10-20k a year. That's a lot!

Second, adding remote employees means they can be closer to potential new clients and prospects--smart business move if you ask me. 

Also, your employees won't be affected if you decide you need to relocate your company. These small things, in effect, can also increase your employee retention because (let's face it), the majority of businessmen and women dream of one day working from the comfort of their personalized home office.

For some companies, remote employees have become a necessity. An even bigger necessity for companies with remote employees is eBridge Solutions!

By storing and retrieving your documents online as opposed to using actual filing cabinets, your employees can access their files from anywhere in the world--as long as they are connected to the internet, of course.

There is also talk around eBridge that they will be launching a new feature to their system that will give users the ability to not only store closed or archived files, but live, working documents as well. Sound interesting? Let us know.

Email info@eBridgeSolutions.com if you want to know the details first... 

Reason #3: Document Management Helps Increase Productivity

The #3 reason to love eBridge Solutions might not be a favorite among your employees, but it will increase productivity in the office. The #3 reason: Reduce ‘water cooler chatter' by putting information at everyone's desks.

'Water cooler chatter' is a common scene in offices where employees have to step away from their desk to retrieve their documents from filing cabinets. One employee gets up to search for a file but then decides that since they're already up they might as well make a pit stop to get some water or grab another cup of coffee, however, they then run into other coworkers who decided to do the same and before they know it they're having a 15 minute conversation about the weather.

With eBridge Solutions employees will get up only when they really need that glass of water or that second cup of coffee. eBridge allows you to scan your documents one time, meaning you never have to re-file them again, then you can view those documents simultaneously without ever having to leave your desk.

If you're ready to stop water cooler chatter and increase productivity in your office, call or email eBridge Solutions today.