Guides

How to scan invoices straight into your archive by email

Most office printers can send a scan to an email address. If your archive has its own address, that one button replaces scanning to a PC, renaming the file and dragging it into a folder.

What you need

• A printer or scanner with a “scan to email” function. Almost every office multifunction printer has one.
• An archive that accepts documents by email. In Kii Paper Vault every company, and every department, has its own private scan address.
• Ten minutes at the printer’s settings page, once.

The steps

1. Save the scan address on the printer. Add it to the printer’s address book under a clear name such as “Invoices – Accounts”, so nobody has to type it.
2. Choose sensible scan settings. PDF, 300 dpi, greyscale, both sides, and “all pages in one file”. Colour and higher resolutions make large files without making the text easier to read.
3. Scan and press send. The archive reads every page, makes the text searchable and files the document in the right department.
4. Check the first one. Search for the supplier name or the amount. If you can find it, the set-up is done.

Scanning a stack in one go

For a pile of invoices, put a separator sheet between them. The archive splits the scan at each sheet, so one stack becomes single documents and you never have to feed invoices one by one.

Mistakes to avoid

• Very large emails. Mail systems often refuse attachments above 15–20 MB. Around 50 pages per email at the settings above is a safe size.
• One address for everybody. Give each department its own address, so purchasing invoices do not land in front of the sales team.
• Sending the same file twice. A good archive refuses duplicates, so a resend will not appear a second time. Look for the first copy instead.
• Forgetting PDFs you already have. Invoices that arrive by email do not need printing: forward the PDF to the same scan address.