Companies that do not manage their financial documents could face harsh penalties, failure to comply can expose directors to imprisonment ranging from a few months up to 10 years, and fines of up to R15-million. This is according to Paper to Digital Storage Solutions (P2D), a specialist electronic record and document management solutions provider.

The company’s CEO Dawid Jacobs says one of the biggest challenges in document management is failure to comply with legislation. “If a document is not compiled under correct ISO standards, the document becomes worthless when it stands in a court of law as being an authentic copy of the original. In some instances, organisations are not allowed to destroy certain financial records, which must be handed over to a curator or regulator if a business is liquidated or ceases to operate,” he explains.

According to the IDC, companies spend as much as 10% of their revenue on managing company documents and their distribution. “The problem of scattered, inaccessible information is costly for today's organisations. The estimate is that the inability to find information costs an enterprise with 1 000 knowledge workers R6 million per annum.”

Jacobs says P2D is driving the paperless office. “Even though a business will never be completely paperless, future legislation will require companies to become carbon compliant. P2D has been a four-year project which we've based on international standards. We've already created strategic alliances in this space and now we are ready to go national.”

“P2D's target market includes both small to medium enterprises (SMEs) and large corporates. The solution is particularly suited to SMEs, as not having to worry about scanning documents means they can focus on their core business,” he says.

“South African companies, generally, are not educated on how they can reduce their carbon footprint. One of the biggest benefits of cloud computing is that business users can access their documents from wherever they are without spending huge amounts on travel costs and the high electricity costs associated with IT equipment,” he concludes.