An experienced Project Manager will meet you to discuss your requirements. We will assess your archive, and discuss details such as; indexing requirements for retrieval; document unstitching/binding; how often a document is retrieved; preferred method of retrieval (CD, LAN/WAN, Intranet/Internet, or a combination thereof); time-scales and restrictions. A cost proposal will be produced so that you can decide if you wish to proceed with the project.

Once agreed, our developers start designing the first software prototype for you to use and assess. In the meantime, our scanning department will initiate the digitisation of the archive, beginning with the creation of a control system for tracing the progress of each document as it is processed, Your documents are stored in such a way that it is possible to locate any one particular file within a very short time period. From our experiences with other clients, access to the property documents could be required on a daily basis. The required document could be faxed, sometimes sent by e-mail, on other times (the majority of occasions) the whole folder would have to be returned by courier. With the complete archive held by sds Property, this process would ensure that any document could be located within minutes of the telephone call while at our scanning bureau.

Clients also have a dedicated e-mail address set-up for them (for example, clientname@sds-group.co.uk), which can be made available to all key personnel with correct security permissions, and can be used to service all requests with expediency. You will be assigned a dedicated project manager to provide any immediate assistance throughout the duration of this project. Should you require one or all of the documents that is being dealt with at sds Property there are numerous ways your project manager can assist you, depending on your requirements:
If documents are returned to you we will scan them prior to sending as a security measure.

To ensure the integrity of the archive, each box is labelled with its contents, which is then copied on to a set of master control sheets. These are used later to control the scanning and create the electronic index of the archive at our secure premises. By packing them according to the previously determined plan, the archive will remain in a known order, and therefore be immediately accessible at all times within a short space of time at the storage location.

A system is further required to log documents travelling to and from sds Property and the client's storage locations (should the client need to physically see the folder). This control system shows where the document or folder was in terms of the scanning and indexing stages of the project, and to ensure that it is properly replaced before project termination in order to complete the database and set of images. sds Property has all these processes and systems already in place.