Warrington Borough Council – Scanning & EDM

Project Background

Warrington Borough Council reached out to Cleardata looking for a solution to digitise their property files. This was due to a forthcoming move to a new-build office, where the emphasis would be on flexible & agile working, with the main objective being to reduce the Council’s office accommodation costs.

As part of this move to agile working, the offices were designed with a very limited amount of storage space. So the brief for Cleardata was to find a solution which would be able to provide access to a wide variety of different file types & for this to be completed within a specific timescale

Key Drivers

  • Reduce paper records
  • Flexible access for remote working
  • Find information quickly
  • Improve compliance
  • Any customer queries were dealt with quickly and to the customer’s satisfaction

The Solution

Cleardata have digitised property files for Warrington Borough Council and uploaded them to their Cleardox Electronic Document Management System, enabling staff to access records from any location using a web browser. Cleardata’s Project Management team captured all of The Council’s requirements for each document into project specification documents, agreeing document output format, resolution, indexing and destruction requirements.

  • Files were securely collected and transported to Cleardata’s scanning bureau
  • Paperwork was prepped ready for digitisation, including the removal of plastic wallets, clips and staples
  • Intelligent preparation was provided for the splitting of property files and land terrier files
  • A4/A3 paperwork was scanned using Cleardata’s Kodak high-production scanners
  • Large-format drawings were digitised using Cleardata’s large-format Canon M40 scanners
  • Files were indexed by plan number, UPRN, and/or name of property, by Cleardata’s data entry team
  • Information was uploaded into Cleardata’s Cloud Document Management System – Cleardox EDM, in the relevant folders, and metadata signed to enable searching via property address or URN
  • Physical files were securely stored prior to approval for destruction
  • Files were shredded using Cleardata’s industrial shredding equipment and a certificate of destruction was supplied

Customer Feedback

“Cleardata have successfully digitised our Property & Building Services Files. This dataset includes files which contain a variety of sizes & document type. For example, some documents were in small card format & others, within the same file, could be AO sized architectural plans. There were also historic deed records and old maps, some of which were in old bound books which were much more difficult to scan. Cleardata dealt really well with the wide variety of documents and the Property Team are now able to easily access high-quality versions of these records, via the Cleardox EDM system. This was an ideal solution for our forthcoming move to agile working in our new offices, but it has also been key in our ability to adapt to the new Covid-19 requirement for the team to work from home. The Cleardata team have always been helpful and professional in their approach to this project. It has run smoothly and, more importantly, was delivered on time.” Property Information Officer, Warrington Borough Council