Store separation in DocuWare is a useful capability for businesses that are looking to expand their operations. By creating separate document stores for each location of your business, you can easily manage all your documents and data in one centralized system.
Contents:
- What is store separation?
- A cost-effective solution for scaling businesses
- Store separation helps multi-location businesses optimize efficiencies
- Improve collaboration for increased sales velocity
- Automate workflows across multiple locations
- How to add a new location to your portfolio
What is Store Separation?
One of the many capabilities of DocuWare is store separation, which allows you to manage multiple locations under one DocuWare contract*. In business types with multiple locations such as a car dealership or retail chain, it’s very important to have a centralized system for managing all of your documents and data. This means that you can add new locations to your portfolio without worrying about additional costs or complexities and solely focus on scaling your business with ease and confidence.
A cost-effective solution for scaling businesses
For growing businesses, store separation in DocuWare is a cost-conscious solution. Other document management systems can often charge “per roof”, which could be expensive if you have multiple locations. With DocuWare, you only pay for the amount of users and/or space allocated, not the number of business locations. This cost-effective approach enables companies to expand their operations seamlessly or even implement seasonal operations, as commonly seen in retail stores, ensuring they remain agile yet financially practical. Store separation in DocuWare is a great way to manage your documents and data across multiple locations, without breaking the bank.
Store separation helps multi-location businesses optimize efficiencies
For companies with multiple locations, store separation in DocuWare offers many advantages. While each location has its own document pool, you can quickly find and retrieve the documents you need from any location as long as the user has the proper permissions. This ensures that sensitive data is protected and only accessible to authorized users. For instance, while a regional manager might have access to financial reports across multiple locations, a local store employee would only access their specific store’s sales records. DocuWare also makes it easy to set up workflows and approvals across multiple locations to streamline your operations across all of your business.
Improved collaboration for increased sales velocity
Store separation in DocuWare enhances collaboration across multiple locations, significantly boosting dynamics such as sales velocity. Let’s use a car dealership for an example of how DocuWare can streamline the sales process. When sales teams generate leads and upload relevant documents, such as credit applications and purchase agreements, these are instantly accessible to the central sales director who may be at another location or even mobile. The sales director can quickly review and approve the necessary paperwork, streamlining communication and eliminating bottlenecks. This real-time document access enables prompt feedback and allows the sales team to finalize deals swiftly, increasing overall sales velocity and driving efficiency across all dealership locations.
Automate workflows across multiple locations
Creating workflows in conjunction with store separation in DocuWare significantly enhances the efficiency of finance and accounting operations in businesses with multiple locations. For instance, when a local employee submits a purchase order request, it can be automatically routed to the finance director at HQ for approval. Upon approval, the employee can send in the order to the supplier and once received, the corresponding invoice can be matched with the purchase order and other related documents in DocuWare. This streamlined process, complete with automated notifications and discrepancy checks, ensures timely and accurate processing of orders and payments, reducing errors and improving overall operational efficiency across all locations.
How to add a new location to your portfolio
Adding a new location to your portfolio in DocuWare is a simple process. As mentioned above, we recommend individual file cabinets for each location. To set up a file cabinet for a new location, you simply reuse and duplicate the file cabinet structure of an existing affiliate file cabinet and assign the access rights as needed.
This can be done through the File Cabinet module within the DocuWare configurations tool. Select the file cabinet from which you want to copy the structure and use the “Export file cabinet settings” option. An XML file will be downloaded:
File cabinet overview within the DocuWare Configuration: Export file cabinet settings
Then, to create the new file cabinet, use the Import option and select the XML file.
Import file cabinet settings from the XML file to create a new file cabinet
The file cabinet creation wizard opens, where you only need to enter a name for the new file cabinet. All other settings will be reused. When the file cabinet is created, adapt the access rights to make it available to the team of the respective affiliate location.
Once the new storage location is created, you can start adding documents and data to it.
You can then instantly search for and retrieve documents from any location, using the DocuWare search function. Having the same file cabinet structure for all locations in place, allows you also to easily search across multiple locations using the “search multiple file cabinet” feature.
The “search multiple file cabinet” option is always the last item in the list of search dialogs
*Legal note
A DocuWare System may be used by all affiliate companies when the parent undertaking holds more than 50% of the shares. Companies not forming part of the group may not use the System.
