Houston Shipping Terminal Drastically Reduces Costs,Time & Materials With Innovative Document Solution
Stuck in an ugly, Balloon-Payment lease and old copiers that couldn’t meet their needs, TexasTerminals knew there had to be a better option. An option that could help them meet the demandsof today’s maritime shippers, and modernize their outdated, paper-laden processes. That’s just whatthey found with a solution developed in partnership with Brian Dye and Visual Edge IT ofHouston, TX.
Business Environment Challenges
A full service, non-union Terminal Operator and Stevedoring company located on the Houston ShipChannel, Texas Terminals has shipping vessels coming in and semi-trucks going out all day. Thedemand of documents to be printed, signed, authorized, shared, stored and kept was a strain on theequipment and personnel. The current process was comprised of outdated MFPs, pricey NCRforms, slow impact printers, and of course, lots of human intervention.
Technology Solutions
After a lengthy and exhaustive search for a technology company that could solve their multi-facetedproblem, Texas Terminals decidedBrian E. Dye and Visual Edge IT presented the bestsolution. Utilizing Sharp Document Systems with OSA (Open Systems Architecture) technology andUMANGO Scanning & Profiling Software, an automated scanning and indexing solution wasimplemented.
This meant no more ridiculous ballooning payment, no more need for expensive 3-part forms, or for an employee to waste valuable time sorting through filing cabinets. Now they could print out onlywhat is needed on their 75-page per minute Sharp MFP, have it signed, put it in the 120-image perminute scanner where it was auto-indexed using OCR technology. It is automatically pointed to theright folder (if that folder doesn’t exist, it creates it according to the naming protocol designated),names the document and stores it away. UMANGO even wrote a unique program for TexasTerminals that would take a single page out of a packet being scanned in, and print out additionalcopies needed of that page only.
Proven Results
Visual Edge IT has provided solution-driven projects for many of it’s 4500 clients, but this was a unique projectthat took imagination and patience to develop and implement. The partnership between Visual Edge IT &Texas Terminals delivered a solution that has reduced the operation costs by over $3,000 permonth! The time, human capital and resources recouped by the implementation of this solution maybe even bigger! Not only are the operation costs lower and resources freed, but access to importantinformation is readily available and easier to access. The price of which is hard to comprehend,especially in today’s fast-paced business environment.