Reno County
Director Kristie Evans knew her Personnel department at Reno County was making great strides in streamlining operations using Fortis document management software. But when she was recently selected to receive the 2004 Best Practices Award from the Kansas Chapter of the IPMA-HR (International Public Managers Association for Human Resources), it was confirmed.
Evans submitted an entry to IPMA-HR citing Reno County’s use of Fortis – developed by Westbrook Technologies, Inc. Her entry was reviewed by the Communications/Award Committee and recommended to the IPMA-HR President for approval. Evans’ Personnel department was recognized for "increasing productivity through efficiencies in operation by the implementation of document imaging technologies" with a plaque.
“Reno County had reviewed various document software solutions and selected Fortis to assist in quickly and easily retrieving documents and handling retention. Some of our document storage was in the old court house. Even though it was located on the property it was still timely to access. This delayed filling document copy requests,” says Evans.
Personnel also lacked a courier service and were severely challenged with moving information among the eight County locations. Internal information was picked up and transferred by various employees, which could take up to three days. Those with outlying offices only picked up internal mail once or twice a week. Now, documents are transferred to Microsoft Word and sent via e-mail the day they are requested. They also began scanning inactive employee files and have since been able to get all 422 employee files into their Fortis system. Job postings and applications are also stored and tracked. The department no longer duplicates efforts by sharing payroll change sheets and other documents with the Accounting and Payroll departments.
Now, they quickly access W-4 forms (tax exempt forms), benefits enrollment forms, new hire and termination information, leave of absence requests, and FMLA (Family Medical Leave Act) forms right from their desktops. “Fortis is an incredible timesaver and has helped us to become a paperless department. Our staff no longer has to leave their desks and look for documents,” says Evans. “We used to have files within our department, in a storage area on the same floor while others were on a different floor. The worst was the files that were stored in the basement, in which case a file copy request from an employee or third-party employer could take 2-3 days to fill. Now, we’re accessing files in about three minutes,” says Evans.
“Ever since we implemented Fortis in 2002, we’ve been finding more ways to reduce costs and speed up processes among the County’s departments,” says Evans. In addition to the Personnel department, Fortis - which is LAN based - has been implemented in almost every area of the County government including the Health department, Juvenile Services, County Recorder, the Assessor’s Office, Payroll, Accounting and the Treasurer’s department.
By using Fortis ERM (electronic reports management) – a Fortis component that captures, sorts and indexes print spool files from various host machines or platforms – the Payroll department stores payroll reports from their AS400 system. “Prior to Fortis, about 1,000 sheets were printed for each bimonthly pay period. Now, with Fortis it’s pretty much paperless,” says Mathews.
The amount of paper and toner used in the Treasurer’s department for vehicle registration renewals has been cut in half thanks to Fortis. The original procedure included four copies per resident. One copy was retained in the Treasurer’s office, another in the County Assessor’s office, one copy was sent to the state Motor Vehicle department and one copy was given to the resident. Now, each department accesses the information from their Fortis system, and only two copies are distributed - one to the state, the other to the tax payer. “Customer service has been greatly improved,” says Mathews. “At least five minutes in wait-time has been reduced per visitor.”
The Deed Recorder office has also become paperless through the use of Fortis. Because the County is required by the state to retain a microfilm copy of each deed, this department uses a Canon DX5060 scanner to scan all incoming deeds into Fortis and on microfilm simultaneously. To accommodate copy requests by abstracting firms, the multi-page records are exported daily to an FTP site for external access. All personal property tax statements are also input into the Fortis system so that when County residents call, employees review their statements on screen with them without ever leaving their desks or asking residents to come in.
With many procedures becoming paperless coupled with the overall savings in time throughout the County departments and a paramount improvement in Customer Service, the IPMA-HR award is a third-party affirmation that Fortis is a powerful business point solution for Reno County. “Our staff has found Fortis to be user friendly - even those who may not have been completely open to change say they will never go back to the old way of working with our files,” says Mike Mathews, director of Information Systems.
Mathews says future plans for Fortis include extending its use to the Planning, Zoning & Utilities department to aid in the processing of planning documents filed whenever zoning changes are made.