7 Common Laser Printer Problems and Solutions for Them

Every machine comes with problems and copiers are no different. Some can be minor teething problems when first installed, but even the best photocopier will run into some issues after some heavy usage.

When they do, there’s no need to kick, scream and shout at the copier because in all likelihood, it’s a common problem with an easy solution either by yourself or someone in the tech department.

Common problems with office MFPs and simple ways to fix them

1.       It takes ages to print

No matter how fast machines are, we always want them to do the job just that little bit faster. There are times however, when the print speed really does beg belief. If you find your print jobs are taking far longer than your patience can handle: Try these tips for size:

·         Lower the print quality – it’s the fastest way to speed any print job up, but it only really works if you can afford to sacrifice some print quality or you may not like the printouts.

·         Use duplex print in conjunction with document formatting to fit more content per page.

·         For networked printers, hook the Ethernet cable in. Wireless signals are affected by distance and interference. The most reliable way to connect a networked printer to a server is directly with an Ethernet cable to guarantee the fastest connection speed possible.

·         Simplify web prints by disabling images. Images are the most costly of print materials because they are nearly always in colour and most information printed only requires mono. When printing a web page, use browser features to disable images. In IE – use the tools, click on advanced, select multimedia, deselect show pictures, reload the page and then go to print.

·         Memory matters too, so if you’re still struggling to get speedy prints, open your printer driver folder, select the properties and see how much memory your printer has. Printers resemble computers more than you may realise and just as you can add some RAM to boost PC performance, you can do the same with MFPs. Buy some memory and improve its performance.

2.       The toner costs too much

Depending who you complain about this to, you’ll get one of two answers. It’s the cost of doing business, but if you ask me, I’ll tell you that any toner less than a 2000 page yield, isn’t worth your money. Higher page yield always.

3.       Windows Updated and I can’t print to the right printer

Any upgrades to an OS can change the settings on the network, including altering the designated default printer. Just go into the printer folder and re-select the printer you want to designate your jobs to be sent to by default.

Another thing that seems to happen frequently on Windows is networked printers showing as offline, when they’re not. Robin Wilson explains this is Windows using SNMP to connect to the network and not all printers use the same.

4.       Prints are coming out looking wet and wrinkled

Meet the occasion when palm meets face. Head slap when this one comes up and you won’t be the first to have come across this problem. It happens when you use the wrong type of paper for a laser printer and if you have experienced this, count your blessings the fuser rollers aren’t damaged. Inkjet paper is coated for ink to absorb. That same coating prevents toner from sticking to the paper and that’s why it comes out wet looking and wrinkled. The heat is too much for it.

It’s confusing when it happens because naturally toner is dry, so the logical thing to do is inspect the unit for signs of a spillage, like a co-worker accidentally spilling coffee or cola into the unit, running away and pretending it never happened. You could spend ages and even call out a repair service and you’d be slapping yourself when you find out you’ve loaded up the wrong paper type.

The lesson there is to read the label on the paper before you put it into the printer.

On that same issue, another common paper related problem is dampness. Printer paper is best kept stored in the wrapper until it’s time to load the printer. Otherwise, you’ll likely to encounter some fuzzy prints.

5.       Paper misfeeds

One reason this can happen is the paper type being too thin, or too heavy for the printer to feed it. It can happen with the right paper type too though, and if it does, you’re best to fan the paper because it may be more than one sheet stuck together confusing the printer into thinking it’s too thick to feed.

The feed tray could also be the problem though, because some are spring loaded. Those can become weak over time and the springs and rollers may need replacing.

This is one reason you should inspect any MFP before you buy or lease it, because even some of the largest copier manufacturers have been known to release models with flimsy paper trays. If they feel slack, they won’t last. Instead, you’ll be adding to the cost of consumables and increasing the TCO of the unit because you’ll have to keep replacing the springs, rollers, or the feed trays.

Inspect before you buy!

6.       Image problems

Any deterioration to print quality will be related to the drum and the rollers. Start your troubleshooting there by opening the shutter protecting the image subsystem. Be careful when accessing this because the drum is sensitive to light.

What you’re looking for is scrapes and scratches because any of those on the drum will transfer to the printed material.

7.       Warning sound’s going nuts!

When the toner is running at critically low levels, some MFPs have sound alerts that can be quite loud. You can go into the sound settings in most and change the alerts to a low volume, however, if  you’re flat out of toner and awaiting the arrival of new stock, in the meantime you can remove the toner cartridge, give it a shake to loosen some of the toner and it should get you by for another few prints. You’re best to do that anyway to get every last drop of toner in each cartridge used. Over the year, the savings add up.

Some problems, like the above, are fairly easy to remedy. Some can be as simple as a few tweaks here and there, whereas others may require some inspection and tweaking inside the unit. Some parts may need replacing, and others just some routine maintenance to get your printing going again. If you find a technical issue unsolvable in your office and your IT dept. can’t get it up and running, you can call our support line on 020 8901 4700 and find out if we can talk you through a fix over the phone.

For more problematic issues with your printer, we can provide a fixed fee laserprinter repair service. All our engineers are manufacturer trained to support major copier brands such as Kyocera, Konica Minolta, Ricoh and Lexmark. To find out if you’re located within our service area, see our map here or give our support team a quick call. 

Core and Advanced PhotoPhotocopier Features: What Do You Really Need?

We don’t need to tell you that when it comes time to invest in a decent Photocopier, you need to be making a smart decision. As with everything in life, decisions are made much easier when they’re based on knowledge and that’s what you’ll get here. Knowledge of the core features first, because those are what we consider essentials for any thriving office environment.

The advanced Photocopier features are when things take a turn because that’s the part where the MFP is tailored to suit the needs of your business. Not the commissions of a sales rep.  Jazz things up as much as you like, it still doesn’t mean you need them.

One of the largest downfalls when buying a Photocopier is paying for features that make no difference to your bottom line. The bottom line is all that matters, well asides from an easy to use user interface, because if your staff can’t use it, it’s worthless.

Here’s some core features that every smart Photocopier should have. Even the very basics matter so let’s start there.

• A paper size guide

Photocopiers for businesses will print to a multitude of paper sizes to cope with various administration duties. Even the most basic of commercial Photocopiers should have a size guide under the lid.

• The tray (or trays)

When looking at the specs of Photocopiers, don’t mistake the trays for paper cassettes. The trays are there for collecting the printed documents and they need to be strong enough to support the weight of the paper they’ll be handling. This is where the design matters because if the trays are just hanging over the edge with little to support them other than hinges, the weight of the paper is more likely to damage them. You’ll find the majority of Photocopiers designed for busy offices use top loading paper trays.

You can see this design in the video for the Taskalfa 2551ci Photocopier on our Youtube Channel here where the Photocopier uses reverse document processing.

• Paper cassettes

The cassettes are where the paper is stored. It’s best to have one suited to the amount of prints your office will be producing. If you have a high print output, the paper cassette should be able to store enough paper to cope with the load. Otherwise, your staff will become frustrated with the amount of times they need to restock the paper. High capacity is very useful and will save operational downtime.

• Control panel

Most of the newer MFP models use touch screens now but older models have control panels on them doing the same thing, just with less functionality. Modern Photocopiers intended for commercial use enhance productivity by having access to software directly from the touch screen panel. This is where the choice of paper is selected, whether to print in colour or not, or if duplex printing is required or to send a PDF copy to a document storage portal you have in the cloud.

All the settings for the print output is done on the control panel. The most efficient are the LCD touch panels as those directly access the software platform powering the Photocopier.

• Toner

Every office needs to be using toner for print. Otherwise, the costs will be through the roof. There’s no two ways about it. For colour Photocopiers, there’s four colours of toner you need to change periodically. Black will need changing the most, but the others; yellow, magenta, and cyan will need replacing too.

When you’re investing in a colour Photocopier, the toner yield matters so look in the brochure or ask a sales rep about the toner yield for any model you’re considering. The higher the toner yield, the less you need to replace them, which equates to less cost for consumables. Toner yield can be anything from 8’000 to 12’000 pages.  Higher is better!

Advanced Photocopier features to streamline document management

The above are the core functions you can expect from any decent Photocopier, but there are further options that could cut your administration cost and time down even further. Whether you need them or not, you or your admin manager will be able to determine that. Here’s a list of some of the most beneficial advanced Photocopier features that could assist your office.

• Document management

All of the major brand name MFPs will have a variety of software to do just about anything you can imagine to help with document management. Take Ricoh for example. Their product page shows they have cloud solutions for document management, document capture and distribution, print output management software, and device management software to help manage a fleet of printers from the one networked computer.

There are many software options to add more functionality to Photocopiers, but whether they’ll be any good for your office or not, only you, your tech people, or staff can decide that.

Due to the complex nature of document management software, we’d advise you contact us for advice on software solutions.

• Document collation

If you don’t know what this is, formaxprinting.com has a super easy to see diagram of this in action. Essentially, if you need to print documents in a specific sequence, you need this feature. Otherwise, the documents will be printed individually and the users will need to sort the pages into the sequence, which will be near impossible if the pages aren’t numbered.

Printing multiples of any document with more than one page is best done with a Photocopier with a collating function. It’s just easier for users and will shave time by eliminating the collating of documents because it’ll be automated and anything a business can automate -usually reduces operational costs.

• Stapling, hole punch, or binding

This is best used, and usually only available on Photocopiers with a collating function because unless you’re printing more than one document, there’s nothing more to staple together. For this reason, if you are considering a MFP with a collating function, you’ll want to consider the finish. Staple the pages together, bind them, or use a hole punch so they can be stored in a ring binder.

• Glossy printing

Anything colour will always look best in a glossy print. This is handy for sales brochures and marketing materials, but not for everyday printing as you need glossy paper to print to, and those sheets are too expensive for everyday use. If you’re considering a Photocopier with glossy printing, you’ll want a bypass tray to store your more expensive paper. Furthermore, you may want to lock that feature for pertinent use only.

• Secure print

There are business solutions to secure Photocopiers from unauthorised printing, helping to reduce the cost. With the ease of printing over networks, employees will always have the temptation to just print anything out whenever it suits, including personal documents.

With commercial Photocopiers having the advantage of multiple users per machine, it’s best to restrict access to certain more expensive print options, and only allow black copies only across the organisation. This way, access to colour copy, glossy print or anything likely to increase your cost, you can restrict user access, or set pin permissions only. That could require your staff to request permission from IT to print to glossy paper, or to your company letterheads. Whatever you want to control, pin access lets you do that.

The Photocopier is only the hardware. The best functionality comes from the drivers and software installed on the Photocopiers. Get expert advice on only the best print solutions tailored to your business needs - contact our team here, or call us on 020 8901 4700.

The Minimalist Guide to Optimising Your Print Environment: 4 Steps is All!

We’ve mentioned it in the past -The print environment… Heck, we dedicated an entire post to it, yet here we are revisiting it again. As we wrapped that post up (linked above), we did mention we’d be back with more, so here we are – doing just that.

In that earlier post, we discussed document management and to go deeper in assessing that, this post aims to walk you through assessing print fleets.

We’re going to start by telling you who this information is not going to help. Those with a small office, a handful of employees and not too much in the way of printing. That’s because optimising the print environment for small operations is simple. One MFP will usually suffice. Connect it to a shared network and one tech guy/girl or your copier supplier can remotely monitor that unit for tech problems, and get useful data reports from the unit to help cut print costs. All with one device!

The business environments this information will help…

SMBs (up to 250 employees) and those with more, and especially for those with more than the one office. The reason for this is that the more employees you have, the more likely it is you have more than one printer, and quite possibly more than the one multifunctional printer. (From here on referred to as MFP)

The only way to enhance your business’s printing process is to optimise the print fleet. Ideally, you want a high employee to device ratio. For example, one printer for every ten employees in an office of 250 employees gives you a print to user ratio of 25/1. Now imagine the ability to increase that tenfold to a ratio of 250/1 and that’s what you can do with a MFP that meets the needs of each end-user.

To reach the stage where you can optimise your print fleet for maximum efficiency, there are four areas to focus your efforts to get a good grounding of what you have, need, and use.

4 Steps to Prepare a Baseline Inventory of Print Devices, Costs, and Identify Areas of Savings

1.       Take an inventory of your existing fleet

We’ll assume you’ve been smart enough to implement network printing. Any tech person would advise that because it is the simplest way to reduce operational costs and minimize downtime. Connect the printers to a network and permit shared access with the tech department controlling permissions.

As your business grows though, there’s often a problem with the first solution and that’s the fact that the networks aren’t always adapted to suit the growing amount of devices shared across the intranet.

Fortunately, that’s a simple problem to fix by using discovery tools to automate the process. A free open source tool that works for Windows, Linux, and FreeBSD is NMAP.

Chances are though; your IT department will already have some sort of network mapping process in place already, because it’s used for more than inventory purposes. The right tools help improve network security by identifying weak spots. On the off chance these tools aren’t implemented, TechRepublic.com lists five others here. It may not be of interest to you, but it will (or should be) an interesting read for your tech support. Send them the link below to bring your network up to speed on technology

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/five-apps/five-apps-to-help-with-network-discovery

Don’t rely on software alone though because as with all others, they rely on other components for them to work. One of those being the printer having “network discovery enabled.” In offices with a number of printers, it is possible for a printer to be down and not discoverable due to this setting, so a physical walk around to account for the devices should be included too. If that’s too much for one person to cover, ask each department to supply an inventory of the printers they have operational and down. You may be surprised by the amount of old printers that simply get replaced and the old ones put into storage. Account for them all!

For the most part, network mapping will be sufficient to give you a good inventory baseline, but back up your findings with a physical walk around to make sure none are missed.

2.       Assess the requirements of the fleet of print devices you have

There are two terms handy to know at this stage. 1) Under capacity and 2) over capacity. They are a real issue in many businesses and often in multiple departments. This refers to the features on the printers that may or may not be needed.

At your reception, the MFP could be capable of printing duplex, colour and monochrome options, ADF, and yet have no lockable paper tray. The requirements for each device should be assessed to ensure the devices you currently have can do what you need them to do. Both for operational purposes and to cover your bases with security as well.
  

To help you decide what your business really needs, you can refer to our print tech information here.

3.       Assess the costs for each device

This part needs to account for multiple costs and it may involve collating information from different departments. Your IT department can tell you the maintenance costs for units, while your supplies and facilities management department can tell you the cost of procurement.

The areas you are concerned with for cost analysis are:

·         Purchase price

·         Lease price/depreciation expenses

·         Cost of consumables (paper, ink/toner, maintenance kits)

·         Cost of replacement parts (IT)

·         The cost of any repairs carried out inc. labour

Two of the largest amounts will be for replacement drums and toner cartridges. In fact, some MFP models (colour) have as many as eight components that need replacing periodically.

1.       Toner cartridges (x4)

2.       Fusing oil

3.       Waste toner collector

4.       The OPC drum

5.       The transfer belt

Over the life cycle of multiple MFPs, those costs can be significant.

Assess the TCO (total cost of ownership) for each print device you have across your business.

Then…

4.       Ask your staff what they need

Quite often, management become embroiled in how investing in new technology will cut costs and expand how far their budgets can go. It’s all great having the latest cost-efficient, and environmentally friendly print devices in your business, but if they don’t satisfy the needs of the end-user, or they don’t know how to work them, the technology is rendered useless.

It’s all about data gathering!

The more staff you have, the more intelligent data you can collect. Network mapping will give you an inventory of all devices on your network managing document workflow. MFPs can give you reports on how efficient or not that’s working across all departments.

What no MFP, or any device can do is give you user input. You need to ask your staff what problems they experience, what features they use versus what isn’t currently available. Every team member in all departments will need to print or copy documents at some point. You’ll know the efficiency of each team member when you ask them.

Consult your staff on how they use printers and find out what they need and what they can do without. The more information you can gather from employees, the deeper knowledge you’ll gain on your print environment.

For offices with singular devices on the network, such as standalone copiers, scanners etc. you’ll be able to find out how many copies go through each device on a monthly basis. That’s essential information to have because when you decommission singular devices on a network to be replaced by a multifunctional, the monthly duty cycle will need to account for all copies across numerous devices.
 

As for the functions your business needs on an MFP, your employees are the best people to tell you what they would use and what’s insignificant for their needs. Those are the people using the equipment, so when you do a print environment audit, don’t forget to ask your staff about how they use the printers, what problems they experience, and what they need from the machines, versus what they can’t do or have difficulty doing at the moment.

There’s likely a few things that employees would feel beneficial but they aren’t as forthcoming with their ideas as you’d like to think they are. Give them the opportunity to be heard and include their opinions in your print environment assessment.

You may be surprised by the amount of things you can cut out the equation and save on print costs. If your administration department are constantly printing in black and white, yet have to select that option for each print job, a simple default configuration could save on printing time and cost nothing but the network admin’s time to implement.

You may even find that many devices are mainly used for monochrome printing, in which case, colour copiers may not even be required. That’s not to say to eliminate them from your fleet completely. Just invest in the MFP with a higher duty cycle to cater to all departments sharing the one colour printer, and downgrade the other colour MFPs to monochrome. Since each colour copier has four toner cartridges to replace, you could save quite a bit by optimising your print fleet to match the needs of your end-users.

Find out what they really need, weigh that against the data you see they use, and factor security into the equation.

The above four steps will give you a baseline inventory of all your print devices, let you know whether they meet your business requirements, and let you see how much each is costing you. Add to that your end-user input and you will have all the data you need to optimise your print environment for real needs and lower the associated print costs from operating overcapacity.

Having your print environment operating overcapacity is a sure fire way to be paying over the odds. That’s why at Copylogic.co.uk, we do not consider our role as solely copier suppliers. We are business partners. We work with our clients, assess print fleets, optimise them, and go further by supporting and managing them. You can use the above four steps to optimise your print environment, or you can call on us to help you with all aspects of print.

Our team can be reached on 020 8901 4700, messages can be sent here and our offices can be found here. 

9 Ways an Electronic Document Management System Will Simplify Your Business

Do you know how much paper your business is using? According to a paper facts statement by Canotec.co.uk, based on a findings from government backed ‘Envirowise’… “The average office worker will use 1584 sheets of paper per month.” That’s a sobering thought, don’t you think? The paper cost is huge and the environmental impact even more so.

The smarter thing to do to reduce the amount of paper your staff go through daily would be digitise as much information as possible.

That’s made possible by employing the right technology. While you cannot replace your workforce with machinery, you can improve their workflow with efficient technology that helps them lower their cost to your business, whilst also reducing the amount of man hours spent on manual filing, retrieval and processing of paper documents.

That’s Where the Office MFP Helps

…Here’s 9 reasons why

1.       New employee on-boarding

During times of growth, even if it’s only seasonal for your business, there’s always going to be a need to bring aboard talent into your organisation to help cope with growth.

The cost of recruitment is significant itself, but once you have the ideal candidate selected, it’s never a good idea to let them run loose on their first day. They need on-boarding, and that’s something every business does differently. Some will have induction weeks, while others may use a buddy system.

Whatever process you have for on-boarding new recruits into your company, chances are you will have some sort of handbook issued. This usually includes your code of ethics, responsibilities, health and safety information, and the dress code expected.

All pertinent information your staff needs to know to successfully blend into their new position can be issued in an employee handbook. By having this centrally located on a digitised system, your HR, or a supervisor can simply click a few buttons, send the document to the MFP, and provided it has a binding feature, the entire handbook can be printed, ready for issuing in under 10 minutes.

“Operating a business without a handbook is tantamount to saying to your employees that not only do you not care, you aren’t interested. This doesn’t drive productivity, engagement, or respect for your business, which means your employee turnover will be high, your recruitment costs high, and your bottom line - miserable.”

~ HR Revolution

2.       Handling changes

This is another benefit to your HR department, as those often come with high operational costs. Bear in mind that HR does not add to revenue generation by their nature. The only thing you can do with HR is minimise expenditure. Employee records may be kept for up to seven years, so if you have a high staff turnover, chances are likely that you have a room full of filing cabinets for storing the files, or perhaps even putting some into storage.

For existing employees, the files will need amending occasionally to include things such as performance reviews, flexible working requests, reducing or increasing hours, and changes to employment contracts. All of these can be time consuming to first find the right documents, as they can and are misplaced in many cases. With OCR scanning, employee files can be scanned and added to a searchable database.

“An AIIM survey found it can often take 37 minutes to find one paper file.”

~ Fluix.io

3.       Maintaining employee performance reviews

In micro businesses (<10 employees), employee management is much easier, because each team member has direct communication with every member of management, and their co-workers. When a business grows to the SMB stage (up to 250 employees), employee management becomes more difficult. The company culture changes because not everyone is communicating with every department as often. Things become departmentalised and when that happens, line managers and HR staff need a way to keep employees engaged with the business and committed to delivering as much service as possible.

Performance reviews are one of the key strategies that help drive employee engagement with each business. These can be conducted as often as quarterly or less frequently on an annual basis. Whatever frequency you use, the records need to be maintained to track performance, and know when it’s right to give a raise, demote, promote, or dismiss an employee. If the latter is the option you choose, it’ll be imperative you have the appraisal documents available should the decision to dismiss be brought to a tribunal. In which case, with an EDM, the records will be easily found, and then printed for use.

"Employees who have a personal development plan, and who have received a formal performance appraisal within the past year, have significantly higher engagement levels than those who have not."

~ Employment-Studies.co.uk

4.       Contract management

In any service based, and indeed in some supplier based businesses, contracts are the hub of revenue generation. For every client agreement, a contract is issued, terms agreed and the document filed.

How do you address scope creep?

Scope creep, if you don’t know, is when you agree to initial terms, and then the job/service then grows to include additional services that are outside the scope of the initial contract agreement. You could be a freelance web designer working on a fixed fee rate, and still on the project 8-months later because a logo changed, or some other details changed the scope of work.

Dog walkers could agree to walk a pet owner’s dog for one hour a day on weekdays, then find themselves working at 7am on a Saturday morning because the client had to work overtime.

Or, you could be a growing business, needing to bring in a construction firm to expand your base to cater to additional staff with more offices, in which case it’s far better to have oversight over all the costs and the project at large.

The University of Portsmouth demonstrates this when they made the move to EDM

“The next phase of the programme will test wider areas where EDM will bring benefits. From September, we will begin work on the following:

[…]

•  Creating and retaining contracts within EDM, to satisfy our duty to have oversight of all contracts.”

~Port.ac.uk

5.       Managing all accounts

Ledger numbers, invoices, accounts payable and receivable, and cost analysis are just some examples of the documents accounting departments, and accounting firms need access to. The GAAP, (Generally Accepted Accounting Principle), requires at times for documents to be retained for up to ten years. That’s a lot of documents to store traditionally, which is why the digitisation of accounting documents is becoming pertinent.

This is an area that MFPs are assisting by using recognition software to index files into a searchable database… freeing practices up from using rooms of filing cabinets, or even cardboard boxes for paper filing.

“Scans can be routed to the cloud by either ftp, Google Docs, Drop Box etc. reducing postage and fax costs and freeing up your time.”

~ CopyLogic.co.uk

6.       Reduce operational costs

Has your company ever been audited? It’s a time consuming process for those using a manual paper-filing system. With files stored only in paper format, it is going to take a lot of time for staff to sift through boxes and cabinets of files to find all the pertinent accounting files required for auditing purposes.

The same goes for any files you need, such as invoices, or a warranty for some of your office equipment, or any machinery. As the AIIM Survey highlighted, it can take someone up to 37 minutes to find one file. Can you imagine the time it takes to find a bunch of files?

A lot!

With that comes the overtime expense. If your staff are salaried, they are not going to be happy with the extra hours they will need to put in. A digital filing system will allow your staff to be more productive, and more importantly, will help your staff achieve a far better work-life balance.

"Storing important documents onsite will incur a number of ongoing costs, all of which will quickly mount up. Staff time taken up when finding physical documents and cost of extra space needed to store a growing amount of onsite documents are just two of the issues faced with companies choosing not to convert their files into a digital format."

~ UK Document Scanning Services

7.       Speed up communication at enterprise level

Businesses of all sizes can benefit greatly from increasing the level of communication. From small businesses scanning incoming mail to route to the addressee, to larger enterprises with multiple offices being able to scan and distribute information electronically, reducing the time it takes in comparison to courier services, and even reducing fax costs.

That’s only touching on interoffice communications though. There’s even more improvements can be had by using EDM to allow your customers to access files stored on your servers. You see this repeatedly with e-commerce businesses. It’s the “My Account” feature, which provides your customers with all their historical account data and make any amendments themselves.

“…Document, information and communications management services help to cut costs, drive efficiencies and dramatically improve document security…

~ Capita.co.uk

8.       Enhance security of all documents

For any office with boxes, or even rooms filled with paper files, there is no way to tell which information has been viewed, or who has viewed certain documents without seeing the hard copy in someone’s hands.

That poses a risk for confidentiality breaches. EDM systems mitigate that risk by giving an audit trail detailing who has viewed what, where they accessed the file, the time it was opened, and in certain systems, there can be notes attached to the system to provide log details for the reason why the file was accessed.

There are robust solutions for EDMs and not all are equal. The most simple solution is to employ is permission based file access. This will require user privileges to be set by administrators, which will mean only those authorised to view confidential documents will be able to access them. That is not so easy to do with a paper filing system. The only thing preventing unauthorised access is a door with a lock on it.

“Document security is critical to protecting sensitive business information, and essential to maintaining a competitive edge, regulatory compliance, and productivity.”

~ Ricoh.co.uk

9.       Manage projects collaboratively faster with Cloud print

Corporations can have a challenging time with document management, because multiple offices, teams, and even contractors require access to shared documents. Traditional cloud print is one solution that helps everyone collaborate more efficiently, however, for printing documents, security needs to be enhanced.

With file sharing on the up, the addition of user authentication helps ensure the right documents reach the right hands in a timely manner.

A range of MFPs and additional software drivers from OEMs put more control in the hands of users and enable project management to be streamlined.

“…You can store, share and retrieve all of your digital files – Word documents, spreadsheets, presentations, images, videos and anything else you want -  in ‘the cloud’. “

~ Sharp.co.uk

The only equipment you need is a Multifunctional Printer with business centric features – CopyLogic’s Speciality

If your business is bogged down with hard copies and dominated by the associated storage problems of each, it’s definitely going to be beneficial to swap your hard copies for soft copies. The only thing you need for that to happen is a scanner. Since you will need the hard copies of documents at some point, it makes better business sense to have your scanning and print outputs combined into one device. Or how about a MFP that does a lot more than that? Like print your own employee handbooks to assist with on-boarding new employees, or helping your HR department streamline their record keeping?

Whatever your print, scan, and digital storage requirements, we can assure you; the right technology will help you manage your documents more efficiently.

Copylogic.co.uk have been around since before the digital era became mainstream. We have installed and deployed numerous MFPs and could do the same for your business.

ContactCopyLogic and discover the technology your office(s) may be missing, and contributing to higher than necessary operational costs. We can help reduce those costs. Call us on 020 8901 4700 and ask us how.

5 Eye-Opening Ways to Get Your MFP to Brand and Grow Your Business

Branding your business is the only way you’re going to grow your customer base. Over the years, marketing focus has shifted toward online marketing, leaving direct marketing in the dust. Yet there are still sales to be made. According to marketingdonut.co.uk, “the most common response rate is between 1% and 3%…” That list will go up with warmer prospects.

Here’s the kicker though: Your existing customers are the hottest leads you will ever have for any marketing campaign you ever do. Yet, they’re possibly the most neglected because your sales team are too busy chasing new leads, without nurturing the relationships you already have.

A multifunctional printer used with just a little out the box creativity can create hypnotic results. To give you the best possible advantage to boost brand awareness, we’ve a few stunning stunts to ensure your MFP can pull off exponential growth for your business.

Feast your eyes on these 5 ideas and give each some serious thought

1)      Colour brochures

Outsourcing colour brochures can be downright expensive. Considering that most print companies have minimum order quantities, you would need a sizeable mailing list and a formidable budget to print and reach each person.

Before nodding in disagreement thinking you can save print costs by printing black and white; you’d have better luck advertising in the local press.

People enjoy, crave even, and expect colour because it tugs on their emotions. Red strikes the stimulation nerve with its visual impact, while blue evokes a sense of trust.

For those of you who don’t have graphic designers in-house, here’s an interesting read about the psychological properties of colour.

Knowing more about colour, you’ll be better prepared for this next one…

2)      Compliment slips

The majority of businesses in both B2B and B2C sectors know the importance of compliment slips. (Shame the public sector doesn’t use these) They are the only piece of printed paper that allows you to personalise marketing material and “with compliments” provide your customers with a direct point of contact. The typical size is around 10 x 21 cm, so you can get three compliment slips per A4 sheet.
 

To get full mileage from them, keep in mind these few things:

a)      Make your logo prominent (in colour too) at the top

b)      Include your business details to the bottom of the slip, contact information and the services, or product range you specialise in

c)       If you plan to (and you should if you can) personalise the slip further with a handwritten note of gratitude, then leave plenty of white space for writing. Besides, you’ll save on ink/toner costs too!

The only thing to be careful of is type fonts. If the font you use to design your material is not installed on the printer, it won’t print what you think it will. The font you use in the design needs to be installed on the print driver. Not all fonts are supported by all colour copiers.

Speaking of fonts, environmentally friendly fonts “could reduce your toner usage by as much as 50%…”

That’s #4 on this list of tips to make your Laser toner last longer.

3)      Branded Return Address Labels or Envelopes

Every item you mail out is an opportunity to impress. Chances are you’re underutilising what your printer can do and that’s to customise your envelopes to help your business stand out. For a small business, printing labels or even adding a branded return address label on the reverse of your envelopes can be enough.

For larger businesses though, you’ll find it far too time consuming to have your administration department peel and stick labels to thousands of envelopes. The time investment alone would butcher your operational costs. Just as franking machines save time and cost by printing pre-paid postage to your envelopes, MFPs save time and money by printing directly to the envelope and you can brand it too.

Use the black ink for type text and jazz it up with your colour logo. You can add it to your labels or direct to your envelopes, depending on your mail volume.

You only need a quality printer with a feeder tray supporting envelope sizes, and duplex if you want to print your return address on the reverse as well.

If you are still printing on labels and it’s only due to a lack of know-how to print to envelopes, this guide from Microsoft should walk you through what to do. It is a long one so for others who know how to use mail merge and data entry for mailing lists, but don’t quite grasp customising the envelope with a company logo, chron.com has a distilled version to do that here.

4)      Stationery

Don’t knock this idea on the basis that you can’t print pens. Stationery covers a host of things, and some you may be paying for when you could have all the tech you need to produce some of your own stationery right onsite.

• Do you order custom letterheads?

There’s no need! You may even find you can invest in a higher-grade paper, better finish, and still look back counting savings. With printer services ranging around the 10p per copy range, the likelihood is that you’re overspending. You don’t even need a top of the line colour copier to produce decent looking letterheads. Considering the advanced technology MFPs have; letterhead printing is stupendously basic in comparison.

• Do you use note pads and/or desk pads?

Have you ever walked into someone’s office and noticed the paper neatly presented on the desk? Large branded desk pads, fully loaded with a the entire year’s calendar down one side, the other with the week’s schedule, and the middle used for scribbling notes down from telephone calls? Or maybe you thought it was professional looking until you noticed they’d been doodling stick men while they were on the phone. The point is that it is branded. It sticks out, and you can’t fail to miss the desk pad. Nor will you fail to notice the branded note pad being used during meetings.

The right printer is all you need to bring these print possibilities in-house. To be more specific about the type of printer feature you need for these types of jobs, it needs to bind the pages together somehow.

How is binding done? Either by long or short edge binding, centre binding, or by saddle-stitching. Check out thefinishing solutions of the Kyocera KM8030 photocopier to get an idea of how powerful binding is for business printing. If you’re in the London area, why not book a demo to see it in action.

• Are you still ordering business and appointment cards?

You can kill two birds with the one stone on this one. Business and appointment cards. No business should ever run out of business cards. It’s like an unspoken rule of business. You just don’t do it because anyone meeting for business purposes expects to be handed a business card.

People attend seminars, live training workshops, networking events etc. and if they aren’t handed a business card they’ll be stumped and left pondering if they said something wrong.

Business cards warm people to you, and appointment cards are (or should be) the follow up. That is unless you’re a dentist or optician, in which case you should be going through a lot more appointment cards than you do business cards. Nevertheless, the one printer can take care of both. Just don’t get them mixed up when you’re networking.

5)      Direct Mail Marketing (the smart way)

There’s a lot to be said about direct mail marketing, but many businesses just don’t seem to get it. Do you need to buy cold or warm data? It might even feel like playing the postcode lottery. Blast the lot or what? Not to mention split testing to refine the campaigns for future marketing performance.

Like most forms of advertising, it gets complicated fast because it’s overanalysed. You only have to look to your Facebook analytics, Twitter analytics, or web analytics to find yourself immersed in data overload for hours, or even days.

There is an easier way. Instead of marketing, try using your printer to communicate with people rather than solely computers on the network. Use it to produce monthly newsletters to communicate with your customers. Crazy what these machines can do, eh? Perhaps you already have a mailing list for which you send a weekly email newsletter, maybe even frequent updates via social media or even blogging.

Your existing customers are your hottest prospects and your biggest spenders. They deserve the best from you and that includes giving them space to enjoy some down time, without being hard sold. There is no need to hard sell warm prospects and existing customers. The trust is already established or else they wouldn’t be permitting marketing communications.

Whatever your industry, back your expertise up by providing top of the line information to your customers. It doesn’t have to come directly from your company. There’s this thing called other people’s content, or OCP for short. You know, like what you’re reading here. Think for a minute if someone in your professional network is actively investing in advertising online or offline. Do you think they would say thanks for the share?  If they’re spending on any of the areas outlined above, it’s safe to say they’d thank you for letting them know about what may be hidden features their MFP has that could benefit them.

The same goes for your customers. Shift your focus from trying to outsmart your biggest competitors and start competing for your customers’ attention. 

Offer them value. Engage with them on social channels. Poll them occasionally to find out how your company is doing. Deliver the survey results in your next newsletter. Update your website regularly and repurpose the content into a monthly printed publication, because not all your emails will be left for reading later. You have a far higher chance your tangible newsletter will. People can read that on the train to work, on their lunch break, stuck in traffic, or nighttime reading.
 

The newsletter gives your audience the convenience of choosing when they hear from you.

In conclusion

Multifunctional printers can:

1.       Print colour brochures and bind them

2.       Print professional quality compliment slips to further personalise your business

3.       Brand all outgoing envelopes with your company logo, return address, and mailing address. Or for smaller print volumes, brand address labels with your company logo

4.       Print your office note pads...

Desk pads

Business cards

Appointment cards

5.       And to peak brand awareness and grow your business - you could print your own monthly newsletter.

If you’re currently paying for any of those services, perhaps it’s time to assess your print requirements, volume, environment, and cost. The savings could be significant if you only put your MFP to better use.

If your current MFP(s) doesn’t have the functionality to perform any of the duties needed in the ideas above, speak to a member of our team, because there’s likely a lot more that you could do to cut print costs asides from what’s listed here.

What ways are you using your MFP to help business growth?

It Pays to Know These Printer Maintenance and Troubleshooting Tips

It Pays to Know These Printer Maintenance and Troubleshooting Tips

As with all machinery, printers require periodical maintenance to keep them functioning at optimum levels. Without care and attention to the units, they will not last as long as they should. With multifunctional printers having many components to them, it takes a great deal of care to keep them in good working order.

To ensure your MFP continues to add value to your business, and not become one of those frustrating appliances that gets the odd kick every now then, the following will stand you in good stead to getting the most production out of it.

Dealing with mechanical errors from the paper feed tray

The paper feed tray may look simple, but for it to work, the rollers must remain free from dust particles. If your office has a dust problem, you will need to keep on top of it. Cleaning is as simple as taking a paper towel across the rollers, or use a microfiber cloth to wipe them down.

Before you do that though, only attempt to clean the rollers that are visible and remember to turn the machine off before you put your hands near the rollers. Where dust is not an issue, you are best to clean the rollers every six months.

If you have a service agreement in place, your service provider will take care of this along with all other maintenance requirements, but if you own your unit outright and do not have a service agreement, then every six months, clean the rollers. Refer to your instructions provided with the unit first though, because there are some cartridges around the paper tray that should never be touched.

Dealing with paper jams (the right way)

One of the worst thing anyone in your office can do (and they often do) is get mad at the printer, ripping the paper out of the feeder tray, expecting to load it back up and everything will work tickety-boo. It doesn’t work like that because ripping the paper can and usually does cause it to tear, and the remaining small shards are then deposited inside the machine. The worst–case scenario is tugging the paper out with such force that it damages the internal components of the machine.

 

Within your instruction manual will be a section that tells you all about the mechanics of the paper tray, which will be specific to the model, because each unit is set up differently.

The universal method to deal with a paper jam is to use both hands, either side of the paper, keeping the stack level and gently pull slowly away from the rollers. When reloading, be sure it’s not overfilled, the pages are flat (no upturned corners), and give the paper a good fumble around to get any pages stuck together unstuck.

Power problems stemming from your power source

In many offices, equipment is hooked into the power supply through a surge protector. The problem with this set up, at least with any modern copier, is that they have a sleep mode. When they aren’t in use, they aren’t absorbing a high level of electricity. When they come out of sleep mode though, the power will naturally spike. That can trick your surge protector into thinking there’s a surge, when in reality, it’s just the printer coming out of sleep mode.

The simple way to avoid this is to plug the copier directly into the wall socket. 

Maintenance kit from the Printer Manufacturer

All copiers will need their toners changing, print heads cleaned, cartridges maintained, and servicing done periodically. The maintenance kits must be brand specific to your model for two reasons. It’s the only way to guarantee the kits will be compatible and secondly, if you don’t, you’ll likely void your warranty.

When you buy a colour copier, or any MFP for that matter, it helps to deal with a B2B photocopiersupplier because the servicing arrangements put in place will keep your machine operational for longer.  

Maintaining the Components of a Laser Printer

Inside every laser printer there are numerous moving components and hardware that need maintaining to keep your printer operational .The frequency the maintenance will need carried out will vary by model manufacturer, usage, and environment.

Multifunctional peripherals for copying, scanning and printing have a print counter with pre-programmed variables set so that when the unit is due servicing, the device will alert you. This is just the same for when you need to replace toner cartridges. The unit will alert you to the toner running low. The same will happen when maintenance is due. It will alert you.

The reason is simply that there are a number of wearable parts in every unit, which will need replacement due to the wear and tear from constant use. Depending on your usage, it may be longer or shorter.

The environment your printer is installed in will affect how often maintenance will need done. For the most part, six-month cycles are sufficient, but if the units are installed on factory floors and/or distribution centres where there the environment is dusty, it may require maintenance every quarter.

How MFPs are maintained

The most used method for maintaining MFPs is to use maintenance kits provided by the manufacturer, or through your copier supplier. Depending on whether or not you took out a service agreement, the supplier may cover all or none of your maintenance. You should consider this when you are buying  or leasing a colour copier for your business, because maintenance costs can be substantial if you have a fleet of printers in operation. 

Top considerations for maintaining laser printers

·         Toner Cartridge Replacement

Toner cartridges are the most cost effective method for volume printing. However, with colour copiers, there are more variables involved than just switching out toner cartridges.

When any cartridge begins to run low, the unit will indicate what cartridge needs replacing. Some of the modern devices available from suppliers have automatic ordering features available, which will notify your supplier to the toner replacement alert. Some will install them, whereas others may not and only ship the toner cartridges for your IT staff to install.

If your service agreement doesn’t include toner replacement done for you, pay attention to the next part…

·         The OPC Drum

For laser printers, the OPC drum is one the utmost important parts of the unit, and it’s also the most delicate. Whenever a print job is sent to a laser printer, the laser beam will strike the surface of the OPC drum, leaving an image imprint. It’s that imprint on the drum that is printed to paper. The toner particles are attracted to the drum and then transferred onto paper. Put simply, you need your OPC drum to be in top condition for quality printouts.

When you’re replacing toner cartridges, you’ll notice that the drum is protected. If you look at your manufacturers cleaning guidelines, you’ll likely notice that it mentions to clean only the visible parts of the unit. The reason for this is the instant you open the drum, you can expose it to light, which is likely to damage it.

That being said, it does need cleaned occasionally. When cleaning, it needs done in a low light environment. It’s best to have a certified engineer do this because they will know the best way to clean the drum. Usually that’s using isopropyl alcohol (IPA).

Any damage done to the drum is irreparable, which is why it’s best to leave this part of maintenance to trained experts who know what they’re doing.

·         The Use of Maintenance Kits

Maintenance kits are available from manufacturers, or your copier supplier. They are essential to keep your printer operational and continually producing quality prints. The most wearable parts are print heads, rollers, fuser units, and toners.

You will find for commercial copiers, as in those designed for high volume printouts, they will have a preset maintenance schedule based on the page output. When you reach perhaps 20000 prints, it will alert you to schedule maintenance.

For those under service agreements, suppliers will usually carry this out, but if you’re doing this in-house, it can be as simple as ordering a maintenance kit from the manufacturer, or your supplier.

The wearable components on modern colour copiers are numerous, which is why a service agreement is usually the most cost effective solution for high volume prints. It rolls all your costs into the one service.

·         Calibration of printers  

Dependent on the model of printer you are using, you may need to complete manual calibration of colour profiles, or you may have software installed with predefined quality targets, making calibration of colour profiles much simpler.

Whatever model of printer you have, calibration will be required at some point. Without the colour profiles being calibrated, you can find your print quality being either lighter or darker.

This is something that the Color Care 2 suite from Konica Minolta is addressing, making it extremely simple for marketing firms, and others who print in full quality colour frequently to benefit from.

If your business is finding the maintenance of your laser printer difficult, advice is available from our team of print experts at here. Whatever your print needs, we have solutions and expertise to cater to a wide variety of requirements.