What are the challenges with manual data entry solution and the benefits of automatic data entry solution?

What are the challenges with the installation of the automatic data entry solution and the benefits of automatic data entry solution?

A business products distributor was manually processing over 300,000 customer orders each year. Heavy order flow prior to shipping cut-off time frames and a highly variable daily volume created staffing challenges and inconsistent order turnaround times. Despite an effort to process customer orders via EDI, the company continued to receive over 20,000 orders per month via fax and email requiring manual data entry. 

 

Challenges with manual data entry solution

Customer Service Associates in three different centres manually entered the orders into the order management system with the added pressure of meeting a shipping deadline. As any manual single-pass data entry process there were many errors, especially during peak processing cycles. 

 

Due to a complex product catalogue, variety of order types received from customers, and the large customer base, finding and training data entry specialists was a challenge. 

 

Fluctuating daily order volumes made maintaining appropriate staffing levels very difficult. 

 

During peak demand periods order processing lags would greatly decrease customer satisfaction levels. 

The benefits of automatic data entry solution

To solve all these problems the company implemented an outsourced automatic data entry solution with sophisticated “free-form” data extraction for their fax and email orders. 

 

The solution was able to recognise and capture data from any customer order format with 99.5% accuracy. 

 

Order input no longer requires the manual data entry of the company’s order entry staff, which has reduced labour costs. 

 

The solution also receives fax and email orders on behalf of the company directly from customers and converts the hardcopy order to an EDI electronic purchase order for the order management systems. The solution includes a customised web-based portal to support exception processing and a secure web tool for archiving and storing images of all of the original order documents. The solution is completely accessible on demand from any of the company’s workstations. The solution was fully operational within 90 days and required zero capital investments in hardware, software or labour on the part of the company. 

 The challenges faced before the installation of the data entry solution were:

· The orders had to be entered manually in their system.
· Due to the manual process, it caused staffing challenges as the volume was high.
· It caused inconsistent order turnaround times.
· Customer service staff engaged in data entry had added pressure of meeting a shipping deadline.
· Due to the single-pass data entry process there were many errors.
· Reduced customer satisfaction.

The benefits of automatic data entry solution

· Increased accuracy to 99.5%
· Labour costs were reduced as Order input no longer requires the participation of the company’s order entry staff.
· As the solution was web based, the solution is completely accessible on demand from any of the company’s workstations.
· The solution converts the hard copy order to an EDI electronic purchase order for the order management systems.
· With the implementation of the solution processing became faster and deadlines met.
· Increased customer satisfaction.