Leveraging the efficiency of the Internet and combining our e-world with electronic information gathering often leads businesses to streamline their information management by investing in a document scanner.

Unfortunately, equipment isn't always the magic bullet to address a long-term document management problem.

Since finding a document scanner with the ability to handle heavy workloads is important, a high-volume scanner is often cost prohibitive in an economic environment with few options for business capital. A typical mistake some business owners make when evaluating a scanning system is to use the scanning feature in an "all-in-one printer."

If you are a business that has large quantities of daily scanning (which most offices do), the typical flatbed scanner, nor even sheet-fed devices found on these printers won't provide the quality or speed you need. That's because electronic data management is useless unless you have the ability to find what you're looking for.

Scanning with an all-in-one only provides a file. Once the scanning is finished, you need to individually assign each file a name that makes sense so you can retrieve it from your computer.

While many scanners have a good range of quality features that make information management less time-consuming than chasing paper all over an office, most major cities have professional paper scanning companies that offer the same pliability, ease of integration you'd find in a scanner you purchase yourself --- combined with technical support and file managers who can take your document storage and retrieval system to an entirely new level of ease.

Below are some great benefits a professional scanning company offers:

• High-volume scanners are seriously fast! The ability to take a massive pile of documents and convert it into an electronic format in an exceedingly short period of time will appear easy. Scanning speeds can exceed 120 ppm ( pages per minute). You'll soon find out that your office can handle even the largest daily scanning needs inside a given deadline. Having the facility to convert your office to a paperless environment in a relatively short period of time can occur simply with a high speed business class scanner.

• The image quality provided by a paper scanning service is umatched by an all-in-one printer or low-volume scanner you'd find in an office supply store. Scanning companies are not only users of prime quality equipment that are exceedingly fast and trustworthy, they also are renowned for making unparalleled image quality in monochrome and color. Your all-in-one printer can't do that.

• Placing a large scanner in a tiny cubicle or office space will only keep the area feeling and looking cramped. Who wants to lose the office filing cabinets only to exchange them with a large hideous scanner? Having a document scanning company at your service won't just save you space; it will also allow you to toss out or destroy documents that are electronically recorded on your computer network.

Once a document is scanned, your scanning company can organize them in an electronic file for scanning and locating via any computer. Documents can also be set up with security rights so that only select individuals are permitted to gain access to the documents.

So before you decide to invest in a high speed document scanner, consider the cost and time intensive process. Stop and research the different scanning companies in your area. There are lots of firms that will even set up a document scanner in your office and do the work for you.