Research company Gartner recently found that, on average, the costs of buying office printers, maintaining and running them typically equated to between 1 and 3 per cent of a company's annual revenues. However, Gary Elms, Managing Director of Danwood Scotland, goes further, inferring that few companies manage their print infrastructure well and he believes that this figure could be up to four times higher.
"For years technology has promised the potential of a paperless office although quite the reverse seems to be true, with print volumes reaching ever greater heights. An overall figure of £16.7billion has been put on the cost of the UK's annual print output therefore it is clear that inefficient print practices could be hampering business growth.
"Office printers do use considerable amounts of paper and electricity as well as "consumables" - inks, toners - which is bad news not just for the company's bottom line but the environment.
"Most organisations tend to have lots of devices from numerous vendors, many of which are old, under-utilised and expensive to run. Some have been purchased while others are 'on contract' but whatever the situation, the key concern is that there is no-one to take overall responsibility for the fleet. Print and document management seems to fall between the cracks in most organisations - sometimes the responsibility of Purchasing, Facilities and/or IT departments - and is rarely considered a boardroom issue.
"Senior managers need to know what devices they have, how they are used and what consumables they have in stock, by means of a print audit, before they can realise their current costs and make significant changes. This can take time.
"In the first instance, auditors attach software to the network to detect individual devices, their serial numbers and collate output information. This is followed by visits to individual departments to find out if there are any devices that are specific to individual PCs or outwith?? the network. Additionally, it is extremely important to engage users to discover how they use the machines, but more specifically, the frustrations they encounter perhaps through queuing or through machine failure."
Elms continues: "Clients are often surprised at the savings that can be achieved by taking this kind of holistic approach to their print, consumables and document storage systems, especially when we can often deliver faster print quality and save them money in terms of employee productivity, their carbon footprint and the bottom line.
"By consolidating ageing printers, photocopiers and scanners with multi-functional devices (MFDs) many businesses find that they end up replacing say, 50 printers and two photocopiers with six MFDs. They not only save money on their consumables but these energy-efficient machines reduce energy bills overall and break down less often taking the pressure off overstretched IT departments.
"The other factor to bear in mind is the 'print culture' of the organisation. We often find strong user-resistance to shared devices, printing in black and white rather than colour and, more so, general changes to traditional working practices.
"The greatest benefits come from changing behaviours. Many users are afraid of change and with a little information and training will embrace the new technology. An awareness of how much it costs to print each page - colour can cost up to eight times more than mono - can help. Setting the machine to mono only and changing to double-sided printing can save on paper costs. And quite simply, a longer walk to the machine will often make individuals think twice about printing."
©2008 The Danwood Group