Optical Character Recognition Services - The Costs And Benefits
It is not generally sufficient to simply scan a text document in order to replace your paper copy with a digital one
. Without the proper software you will be left with an image of your document rather than a fully usable the new text document. The difference is, an image document is viewed with an image viewer whereas a text document can be edited using virtually any word processing program. In order to truly convert your paper documents to digital ones you will need to use optical character recognition services. This form of technology has been dated back to the late 1920's with Germany being issued the first patent on OCR. This type of service utilizes software that not only scans documents but also converts them into a new text document.
Utilizing an outside source for this type of service can be a very cost effective alternative to buying the equipment and training an individual to do it all in house. Companies that offer this type of service specialize in document management and can help convert your paper documents into fully searchable and editable digital formats. It is not just text documents that can benefit from this type of service. Whether it is drafts, numeric data, and even technical information and contact information, they can all benefit from OCR services.
These types of services may also include such quality control measures as spell checking in order to maximize the overall accuracy of every one of your documents. Extra services such as this may add the overall cost, however. Regardless of additional costs for additional services, the prices for optical character recognition services are much less expensive than the cost of doing these things on your own. It is also much less expensive than you would have probably ever believed. They can also convert poor quality originals into high quality digital copies with minimal effort and for little extra cost.
The advantages to utilizing services such as these go well beyond the simple time saving. It is now much easier to edit documents that have been stored on paper only. In addition, digital copies can also be saved in a much wider range of available formats than just raster image. Even transmitting digital copies of your fully recognized documents can be done in a more secure and safe manner than was possible with a scanned copies. The efficiency, security, and cost savings that you will see once you utilize the services will be nothing short of astounding.