Criminal DA Courts (CDA) process thousands of felony case files annually. These case files can include a wide range of cases including everything from Substance Abuse cases to Assault and Murder cases. CDA case files typically need to be retained for many years and must be quickly retrieved should the case ever need to be reopened. The effort required to retrieve these files is extremely time consuming for the CDA Court’s staff as they try to navigate to the correct box or filing location. The boxes and filing systems needed for managing these case files also takes up a large amount of storage space. Often these files are poorly inventoried and may also be stored in remote locations. These files may also be protected by HIPAA and other regulations and the CDA courts are responsible for properly securing the information regarding the release of documents from these files. The solution to better managing these case files is to have them digitized and then to store the digital image in an Electronic Content Management system (ECM).
Here is the process we use to digitize CDA Case files:
Steps in the process:
1) An assessment is made of the documents and indexing requirements with the CDA Court’s records management staff.
2) A complete inventory of the files is created.
3) A cost proposal is presented to the CDA’s management team for approval.
4) Upon receiving a Purchase Order from the CDA.
a. The boxes of Case Files are moved to our scanning center.
b. The files are prepared for scanning and scanned on our high-speed scanners.
c. Indexing is accomplished using database information from the CDA Court’s information system whenever possible or manually indexed.
d. The scanned documents were uploaded to a cloud based or on-premise Electronic Content Management (ECM) system.
e. When requested the ECM system is linked to the court’s information system allowing the record management staff to retrieve the files without having to log into the ECM system.
f. The scanned files are returned to the court for long tern storage or shredded.
Benefits of the solution:
· Retrieval times were reduced from hours or days to minutes.
· Staff utilization was targeted to more valuable tasks.
· A disaster Recovery solution was implemented by digitizing the files.
· Auditing the access to these files is now electronically secured and tracked.
The Cost versus Value Decision:
The cost versus value decision has been simple for our CDA clients. The wasted employee time looking for records and the wasted storage space issues had to be addressed. The digitization of the Case Files solved these and many other issues. The return on investment was completely realized by the elimination of wasted employee time.
Contact us for help:
If you would like to learn more about our Criminal District Attorney Case File digitizing experience or the other record digitization strategies that we have developed for our clients please give us a call or email us, we will be glad to help you.
ECM Today!
(833) 227-6552
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.ecmtoday.com
Comments are closed