Recall

THE CHALLENGE

Recall, like many Australian organisations, is focused on cost reduction and improved business efficiencies as priorities, whilst delivering outstanding customer service and industry leading security.

When Simon Hughes, Commercial Manager for Recall Australia examined the key influencers on these priorities it was the growing volume of data that was being printed, stored and inefficiently handled across their business that stood out for him.

To meet its print requirements, Recall Australia was using more than 320 different devices across its 42 offices throughout Australia. These fleet included printers, copiers and scanners, primarily single function devices that had similar capabilities.

Regular office orders were being placed for toner (often in excess of requirements) and unused paper and cartridges sat in storage for lengthy periods of time. The business had more than 60 different vendor relationships in operation, each with unique service agreements, invoices and maintenance rosters to be managed at any one time.

The range of vendor relationships did not provide Recall Australia with the flexibility to  adapt its device fleet to suit changing business requirements.  In addition, the inconsistent deployment of solutions across different areas of the business meant that costs were varied  and it was near on impossible to accurately chargeback costs to departments and P&L owners. 

Hughes estimated that the business was spending an exorbitant amount of money per annum on management and maintenance of these devices. 

THE SOLUTION

Recall Australia engaged Upstream Print Solutions to conduct a review of its current printing and document management environment and to propose a solution that would allow for future growth plans.  Following the audit, Upstream designed a solution that allowed Recall to:

• Reduce overall print management costs
• Streamline its print fleet across the country
• Reduce vendor contracts and associated administration
• Implement interdepartmental print volume reports
• Convert upfront and monthly costs (e.g. toner, maintenance) to fixed rental fees
• Reduce IT administration and management
• Streamline processes across the business that were traditionally paper heavy

The solution was also supported by Service Level Agreements (SLAs) to ensure maximum uptime and fast service response and designed to adapt to Recall’s changing business requirements.  It has both simplified and reduced the IT and financial administration burden associated with print management for Recall. 

 “We achieved great cost savings, but more than this it was Upstream’s ability to streamline our business process and reduce the burden on the IT department that added real value.  We had processes that were slow and labour intensive because they were heavily reliant on paper based tracking.  Upstream implemented a uforms solution which allows us to easily scan and record shipping dockets, saving time, paper and cost throughout the business,” said Hughes. 

Analysis of the results from the company’s print management solution implementation reveals significant cost savings and efficiency improvements across the business.

In addition, Upstream helped Recall reduce the IT burden by reducing the number of printing manufacturers from 14 to just two and number of different printer models from 60 down to 10.  This had a significant effect by reducing helpdesk enquiries and allowing the IT team to resolve them far quicker.  In addition, support and maintenance is provided by Upstream meaning there is a single number to call in the event of any issues.