Woman with her hand extended signaling to stop (only her hand is in focus)Five Things You Should Stop Doing With Your Printers Immediately

There’s an old saying that hindsight is 20/20, and if you knew then what you know now you would have done things differently. This is often the case when businesses pause and actually assess their printing environment. Things like:

  • How much is actually being printed throughout your entire organization
  • Whether or not you have redundant devices (multifunctional copiers, desktop printers, fax machines, scanners)
  • How much you are outsourcing to a print-for-pay shop
  • Unnecessary IT disruptions when your copier breaks down
  • Consumable supplies such as toner, ink and paper

It’s a lot to manage, and most organizations don’t truly manage it; they just get by.

Whether you’re on the fence about a managed print partnership, or maybe you’ve never heard of the concept, here are five things you can do today to stop the financial hemorrhage that is your printing environment:

Ignore the Brilliance of Printer Defaults

Print drivers have default settings, meaning they can be preset to automatically select a specific set of print options when someone goes to print unless they consciously change the print properties. Settings such as black and white over color, or two-sided printing over one-sided can come in handy especially when the average worker prints 10,000 pages a year. Imagine the cost savings if that same worker printed all those pages two-sided and in black and white?

Store (and Damage) Too Much Paper

One of the main reasons copiers have paper jams is because paper is damaged. Paper that has been left to sit for long periods of time on a shelf can not only get bend and rippled, but can also absorb moisture over time. This can cause preventable service issues. Instead, store your paper in a cool, dry place, and don’t let it sit unprotected for too long. Before you print, always inspect the paper you put in a tray, set the tray guides to the appropriate paper size, and fan the paper stack before you close the tray. If you frequently find yourself with an excess of paper (ie. you have your cleaning crew dusting it because it has been sitting there so long), print monitoring from a managed print partner can help reveal your true volumes over time so you know just how much you need to keep on hand.

Allow Employees to Have Desktop Printers

While convenient for the single user, a desktop inkjet printer can be expensive to maintain. If desktop printers are a common thing found in your office, consider consolidating them and route that user’s print jobs to a shared device. Not only is the cost per page on a standard inkjet printer 3-4 times more than a laser print from a multifunctional device, but the ink is costly with very little yield.

Make Printing Convenient

Considering 65% of documents get thrown away or recycled the same day they are printed might suggest that much of what we print should never have been printed in the first place. That’s why device location can sometimes play a big factor in how much a printer is utilized. If a device is conveniently located outside of someone’s office, they are more likely to use it to grab a quick print, and in turn, throw it away more than half of the time. When devices are kept in not-so-convenient places, workers might give printing a second thought if it means having to get up and trek across the office.

Force Fit Toner and Trays

Whether it’s toner, or a paper tray, chances are it’s made of plastic, and forcing things into your copier wont do anyone any good. Toner and trays are designed to move easily so if they don’t, either the toner is the wrong kind, or there is something wrong with the paper tray. If you’re managing more than a couple of devices within your organization, misplacing a device’s unique toner type can easily happen. Instead, consider a better way to store and locate the correct supply and place a service call if you can’t troubleshoot the paper tray yourself. Better yet, hand it all off to your managed print partner.

Whether it’s done on your own, or with a managed print partner, gaining visibility into your organization’s printing habits can make it crystal clear as to what you should and should not be spending your monthly operating budget on.

On top of managing your fleet, a managed print partner can:

  • Perform an initial printing assessment that will give you a big picture of your printing habits
  • Make recommendations to streamline your existing printer fleet (regardless of the brand of your devices)
  • Suggest ways to save on consumable supplies and replenish them exactly when you need them
  • Help you reduce your carbon footprint with energy-saving changes
  • Act as an extension of your IT department, taking on printer-related issues
  • Provide technical support and key operator training so your teams know how to get the most out of your fleet
  • Automate manual document processes for faster approvals and payments
  • Potentially save you 20-30%

Ready to start saving? Ask us about our free print assessment so you can see just how much you didn’t know you were spending.

 

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