With the ability to use .pdf + digital signatures, docusign, etc. I'm not sure it's needed anymore but it's the way it's always been done so that's the way we do it 
'
I'm genuinely surprised by that as we do all that stuff electronically so we can search it, tie it to other well documentation properly. It's pretty useles on paper
Large public sector organisation. The only paper I can think of is log sheets in vans and pool cars.
The lack of paper doesn’t mean a lack of tedious ‘paperwork’ though and many of our systems are painful and annoying. We have gazillions of awful massive spreadsheets and multiple data entry into parallel systems that don’t talk to each other.
Personally, never. I also don't remember the last time I wrote anything work related down in a notepad or similar. The last holdout was interview notes, but even those are all online now.
The lack of paper doesn’t mean a lack of tedious ‘paperwork’ though and many of our systems are painful and annoying. We have gazillions of awful massive spreadsheets and multiple data entry into parallel systems that don’t talk to each other.
One of the unintended consequences of paperless (and, in local Government systems, exacerbated by austerity) is the sheer number of third party software providers who pop up with "digital solutions", hawking their wares to councils in particular who are often only too happy to offshore their HR, finance, payroll, legal etc to these providers and they then end up with massively clunky unwieldy systems that won't talk to each other, were never really designed for that purpose, are unique to that council, and only about 2 members of staff actually know the full details of the system in question.
I work in A GP practice, what d'you think?
Though I did hear recently the last office fax machine was only turned off last year!
At my old place, we sold (amongst other things) MFDs - big office photocopier printer things. They had the ability to phone home (ie, us) when supplies were running low so that they could automatically be reordered. The modern machines were, well, more modern but the older ones were set up to do this via fax. Last I heard this is still a thing, they come in of a morning to a batch of overnight orders sitting on the printer.
I work in A GP practice, what d'you think?
Dunno. should be paper free. My GPs is pretty much paper free
Yes as above loads of documents get printed out filled in and scanned, however currently moving away from 'A-Site' IMS which is shite, to new system (slightly better). We print out loads of permits to give to teams on site ( heavy civils) so that always available at the point of work if inspector types turn up. we have found tablets /phones etc to not work in the rain,mud etc. also in remote places connections can fail. it wont be long till each work location has cameras up to control things
My GPs is pretty much paper free
By paper free, if you mean letters and appointments notifications and 'scripts and so on are electronic, then yes of course we do all those things, I doubt any of our GPs/Nurses have printed a 'script since COVID, but paper-free internally? I'd bet money that every GP practice in the country has a sizable cost line that includes print and stationary consumables (and most of that is going to be reams of A4).
Small company and we only stopped using triplicate carbon paper with a dot matrix printer two years ago.
The downside is we now have to manually fill in all the site details, which used to be printed out. Because the office don’t/won’t.
So last visit reports get duplicated and edited. Leading to errors. As it’s a pain in the arse/slow to do on a tablet at a job site.
On a similar note, due to a pain in the arse bit of test software about ten years ago, we would have to print certain certificates out, the office would scan them, then shred them.
Small/medium manufacturing company, pretty much everything is digital in the offices, but works orders, etc. are printed and issued. Mainly due to the number of machines and people that would all need some sort of digital access. The works orders also contain the routing instructions so they need to be available at each machine (over 100 machines). Paper also means I can walk into the factory and read what a machine is doing because the order is there and visible.
There are plans to change this, but it's challenging, even simple stuff like getting working wi-fi into the factory turns out to be not simple.
Local Authorities have senior personnel who have some sort of app ADHD. We'll expect everyone to fully commit to the next shiny app that only does 75% of the day to day job for 75% of the people. Then 12 months down the line when the free trial is over it's onto the new app.
sometimes... based in US and certain contracts and NDAs, etc have requirement for wet ink signature! print, sign, scan, email for counter-sign... lunacy!
In fact I lie. Some of the sub contractors use paper timesheets that I scribble some signature on.
IRATA are trying to move away from paper logbooks onto digital logbooks to record worked rope hours.
Started a new job in further education this week. Everything is on the computer. Then we have to print everything out when meeting the Learners for them to read and sign.Then the paper goes back to the office to be scanned and saved on the computer. Apparently it is possible to do it all online on a tablet, but the program will not work on laptops as it requires an network connection, the tablets have a sim card so can work pretty much anywhere. I've asked for a tablet rather than a laptop, there is a long waiting list, so the printer and scanner are going to be working all day for a while yet.
I'd bet money that every GP practice in the country has a sizable cost line that includes print and stationary consumables (and most of that is going to be reams of A4).
well i dont know for sure but i see no evidence of that at all.. What would they use that paper for?
Yes; a few reasons. More and more of our internal processes are going paperless, either horrible .doc or .xls to fill out, save, and email, but increasingly MS Forms (however, where does the data collected go and who uses / accesses that data for what and how - we don't have a massive BI team and have fallen foul of creating an updated form for a process that we then have to put the report into the backlog)
A lot of our external though remain paper based, at least at the end - we're the ultimate calibration lab and that means some of our calibrations are done on equipment that is decades old (the process to change the way you measure a base unit takes agreement from literally the whole world and years or decades to verify, so doesn't happen fast). So while we can (and are) working to digitise the workflows some kit just doesn't do that, it relies on reading numbers and creating a record of them.
And then also some of our customers are not yet ready for digital certs, in the main a pdf of the cert is being accepted but some still want wet signed paper that sits in a file with the others from the last umpteen years. If that's what the quality process says, we can't change unilaterally.
well i dont know for sure but i see no evidence of that at all..
I don't know, so it can't be true?
thats not what i said. when working in the community more than 10 years ago i was in multiple gps and saw virtually no paper printing then.
Im interested in what you use a printer for so much
Everything form prescription for foiks who're not smart-phoned (still a sizeable bunch of folks), documents, legal forms that are processed by GPs, printed letters SR1's FIT notes (probably the thing our GPs print the most), every blood/urine sample has a printed label attached to it, death certs are still a big book, GP1 - people registering, I have to have copies of IDs and certs... posters, notices (sometime legal ones that we're obliged to stick up (even scottish GPs) . All the things that a normal small business would use paper for.
Just because something is outside your experience of a thing, doesn't mean it still isn't true. OK?
Oh yeah and once it's rubber stamped and wet ink signed. What do we do with it. - scan it into the client's online system for record keeping.
It's the like the dark ages.
TBH I don’t think it’s that bad, you’ve delivered a contract to the client and they’ve sign it.
Not everything has to be electronic end to end and I expect it’s not for small sums of money.
Fire Service here. Not really, pretty much everything is delivered electronically via email, Teams or Powerpoint.
TBH I don’t think it’s that bad, you’ve delivered a contract to the client and they’ve sign it.
But - 400 pages. I get why they have done it to ensure the tpi physically has to at least look at each page and see it exists as opposed to asking Adobe to watermark each page with a stamp then using e signatures......
Funnily enough never bothered me when the QA dept took care of it....:)
'High performance' manufacturing. High variation, low volume manufacture for military/nuclear/oil and gas etc. Many of our clients actively WANT wet signatures on paperwork steps so yes we still have paper based systems to some degree.
We do digitise where we can though.
Yes, we use quite a bit in my particular area of education.
Apart from physical exam papers, which I think are going to be around for some time to come, my specialism is student support, and particularly the Disabled Students Allowance.
Every student has to have a paper timesheet where their support sessions are recorded and signed for by the student. (About 70 of them) Each of these are then scanned and invoiced to the DSA every month to claim the payments back from them for the support provided.
This is nothing like the amount of paperwork that was used when I started the job 5 years ago. We used to have 7 filing cabinets of the stuff with data unnecessarily printed out about everything. No-one could tell me why they did this so since then I have got it down from 7 to 1 cabinet and digitised so much of the work, which has simplified so much of it, as well as saving a lot of time and paper. The waste previously was just horrific, but that was part of the reason I was brought in to the job.
thats not what i said. when working in the community more than 10 years ago i was in multiple gps and saw virtually no paper printing then.
Im interested in what you use a printer for so much
I work in NHS pathology, we still require paper request forms for all samples from community and Acute. There's a move toward paperless, but the systems we use to book the samples in are not quite up to handling paperless yet, we'd need to overhaul our workflow and we just don't have the resource to do a proper job of that.
It'd be great to go fully paperless, we should've been there years ago, but my experience of being involved in various IT projects in pathology over the years means I don't want to tackle it. It'll be under funded, under resourced, badly planned and a half arsed outcome will be accepted. It's not worth the hassle.
Some clinics still expect paper reports and I've no idea whether they're up to with digitising patient notes. But there's still medical records clerks carting records around the hospital from dept to dept. There's mine boggling as well.
the program will not work on laptops as it requires an network connection
Wait, what?
The program needs a network connection at all times to access the pages we require. When we take a walk around the site, or go out to see Students, we cannot guarantee there being a network connection, all the documents are in the cloud, hence using the laptop outdoors is useless, as they have no connection, but the tablets have a sim card, so can get mobile coverage.
Its a mix for us, digital surevy stuff on tablets for some jobs, paperwork for sites that are really grim, or where things will go bang in dramatic ways if non atex rated stuff goes near them
Not everything has to be electronic end to end and I expect it’s not for small sums of money.
Has to be, no. But it should be or, at least, there's little reason why it shouldn't be. Especially if it's not for small sums of money.
all the documents are in the cloud, hence using the laptop outdoors is useless, as they have no connection, but the tablets have a sim card, so can get mobile coverage.
Tether it to a wireless hotspot on your phone? 🤷♂️
i didnt say that. FFS
In today's headline news "Most argumentative poster" award winner TJagain, is pissed off that people treat him as if he's the most argumentative poster, shocker.
We produce bacteria used in silaging, and animal feed etc, so have to document and record everything. Partly for full traceability, and to see if there are any benefits during processing adding a media element at a certain stage. For the first part of the process we have tried going paperless, however the second part, weighing out the cryoprotectant is done using paper and pen.
Fascinating read this - what STWers get up to when they're not posting.
I doubt any of our GPs/Nurses have printed a 'script since COVID
My wife had to drive across town to the hospital today to pick up a printed out paper prescription.. ffs.
I started the thread because apparently 49% of workplaces still have some paper processes (which seems accurate based on this) but also we use on average 7,500 A4 sheets of printer paper each year per office worker which I find remarkable. That's 28 a day!
Does anywhere not?
Even in a supposed paperless office I'll bet they still have plenty of printers.
3200 employees, 12 offices, we’re paperless (IT sales) & still have printers but I’d struggle to tell you the last time something non personal was printed out.
Whilst we occasionally sell ink/toner, we rarely sell printers.
We sell hundreds of thousands, if not millions of pounds worth of signature, asset management and workflow software, mind.
My wife had to drive across town to the hospital today to pick up a printed out paper prescription.. ffs.
I quite like being given an envelope buy the surgeon as I woozily walk out of the recovery room with instructions to hand deliver it to my GP. Feels retro
Yep. We do everything on paper which is then put onto computers for ease of access. The paperwork is always kept so If there is a cyber attack and information is altered we still have the originals. This is for traceability because we deal with vital ,global infrastructure.
As a mortgage broker for 30 yrs+, we used to love paperwork!! Faxes coming through all day with new interest rates/products, 15 page mortgage applications to complete in black ink to then post in a red thing on the high street!. but slowly as a broker we have lost most paperwork and it is great.
The Banks/Building Societies however...most embrace secure email, portal uploads etc but there is still the odd lender where a mortgage offer is sent in the post to a, the client, b, the solicitor and c, the broker. We then call up to make a rate change due to lower rate and yup, there we have another 3 copies going out to all parties, and that can happen 3, 4, 5 times during the process prior to completion.
Then there is the solicitor... many still old school, 9-5 Mon - Fri, 1hr lunch, finish early on a Friday!!
Yep.
Loads of checklists and records printed and signed.
Permits To Work, still paper.
Ridiculous as pretty much everyone who has needs to fill in this paperwork has ready access to a computer.
We are trying to transition to more electronic forms, but it's such a ham-fisted system, nobody wants to use it.
we are 100% digital. Mostly it’s good, but there are somethings which maybe are too easy to “click ok” when a paper form might trigger some actual thought.
also Lothian GP here, but if they get blood tests or similar they text me AND post a letter - even when I’ve responded to the text within a few minutes. And for maximum irony - to register for online prescriptions ordering I had to fill in a paper form, and they posted out a password! To change the pharmacy where my prescriptions go? Another paper form!My GP texts me
Internally, yes. Pretty much 100% paperfree.
The only thing IT seem to have to do to our printers is repair them as they've been sat so long, unused.
Only exception is documentation that gets sent to the authorities in certain countries that requires to be paper with proper signatures. Mainly for homologation and sign off of emissions stuff and other legal requirements.
US is the worst.
We're expected to print off the *entire* standard that we are fulfilling, then all our relevant internal requirements, plus risk assessments, FMEAs, test reports, etc etc etc. So it's quite often ~1000 pages. Then they digitize about 10-20 pages, title pages, key results and signatures for safekeeping and pop the 1000 page paper copy in storage somewhere. Never to be seen again.
Someone has to work within the systems to make sure that when we print off, it's all formatted correctly, or they'll reject it.
Internally, no, it's all stuck somewhere in ****ing Sharepoint.
Externally, yes - a lot of what we do is governed by legislation that still requires stuff to be sent via post to registered offices.
the program will not work on laptops as it requires an network connection
Wait, what?
The program needs a network connection at all times to access the pages we require. When we take a walk around the site, or go out to see Students, we cannot guarantee there being a network connection, all the documents are in the cloud, hence using the laptop outdoors is useless, as they have no connection, but the tablets have a sim card, so can get mobile coverage.
Just hotspot it off your phone. or tell the college to get better wifi!
