BPO service provision can be a difficult task – yet incredibly worthwhile if it’s done correctly. One example of a company doing it ‘just right’ and working with ReadSoft is Ratiodata IT Solution and Services, based in Germany.
Ratiodata IT Solutions & Services is a major business process outsource (BPO) service provider supplying IT and HR systems, and scan and document services to more than 370 customers. At its two digitisation centres, Ratiodata processes 100 million documents every year.
Issue
To meet a wide range of customer demands, Ratiodata required solutions from different suppliers on the market, each designed for handling individual tasks. This led to the setting up more than 1,200 different processes it was facing increasingly high development and testing costs.
Martin Greiwe, Managing Director at Ratiodata said: “We wanted a modular solution that enabled us to quickly and easily develop processes. We could then implement this as standard for all customers, so we could start new projects more quickly – without needing to closely customise each process.”
Solution
Identifying a need for a central production platform, Ratiodata chose ReadSoft XBOUND to organise all 1,200 production processes in its scanning and document services division.
ReadSoft XBOUND is a single integration platform for all input management related applications and processes, including production scheduling and control across multiple clients, based on a standard software framework, guaranteeing highest scalability and reliability.
After digitisation, documents are handed over to the ReadSoft platform for text recognition and classification. The extracted information is then prepared for other systems to carry out production data capture, accounting, billing and Track&Trace, as well as for export to the customer. XBOUND also enables the integration of a wide range of modular functions including creating PDFs, performing OCR or processing invoices.
With its modular processes XBOUND enables Ratiodata to develop and test standard activities to be used with any customer. Entire processes can be copied, or derived from templates, and essential modules can be used in every single process. Central functions, such as document structuring, are permanently available as modules, removing the need to implement them individually for each process.
The result
This approach has resulted in significantly reduced development and testing costs for ratiodata when setting up new production lines for customers. Due to reusability and standardisation, a current project processing 50 million pages over three years has shown a saving of around 50% compared with the previous production management system.
Some documents lend themselves well to automatic processing, while others require manual checking, but with XBOUND, Ratiodata has balanced automatic and manual data, scaling to the optimal level of automation across its entire project portfolio.
Ratiodata is also able to monitor every element of production, providing process reliability and transparency for every step. As XBOUND is based on a service-oriented architecture (SOA) this makes it much easier to distribute work and to carry it out in multiple location simultaneously. Customer jobs are handled only once, regardless of where different parts of it are being processed.
With a fast, simple to use solution which replicates common processes, Ratiodata has been able to reduce software development and consulting costs. “This increases our competitiveness, and we can now put our services on the market for less,” says Martin Greiwe. In addition to passing on savings to its customers, they also benefit from quicker and easier enrolment, and improved quality of service and control over their document-driven processes.
Overview:
- Production platform for over 370 clients
- One platform for scanning to archive, searchable PDF/A creation, invoice processing, mail room automation and more
- Fast and easy, autonomous implementation of new clients and processes
- Processing a mix of paper and electronic documents
- Load balancing at different locations and integration of local sites.
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