Challenge

As Bashas’ has grown over the years, so has the amount of paperwork and information the company has produced and retained.  Like many companies, Bashas’ eventually reached a point where effectively managing corporate information and processes became inefficient and complicated.  Paperwork was stored across multiple locations including individual stores, corporate offices, and warehouses.  Functions and departments such as Accounts Payable, Worker’s Compensation, and Records Management were operating with manual processes, and tracking down critical information was time-consuming.

For example, Bashas’ fields approximately 1,500 worker’s compensation claims each year, which needed to be stored for a certain period of time.  There was no process for storing this data.  Claims older than two years were boxed up and filed away.  Looking up old claims sometimes took hours.

Bashas’ realized the time was right to find a better solution for managing corporate data and for automating business functions.  They selected IBM’s Content Manager for an enterprise solution.

Solution

Unfortunately, Bashas’ first attempt at implementing Content Manager through an outsourced vendor did not go smoothly.  After six months, the company was back where it started.  In an effort to analyze what went wrong, Bashas’ asked Integro to evaluate the unsuccessful implementation.  Although wary about working with yet another vendor, Integro’s approach to project management quickly earned their trust.  The assessment resulted in a recommendation to scratch what had been done before and start over from the beginning.  Within one week, the Bashas’ and Integro team re-implemented Content Manager and had the system fully functional.

Next, Integro took on the task of automating Bashas’ Worker’s Compensation department.  Again, after only a week, Integro designed a new process for the department, complete with custom templates that use Kofax Ascent Capture with VRS into Content Manager.  Kofax Ascent Capture provided a solution where Bashas’ hard copy claim documents were each scanned with a separator page containing meta data on the front, and then attached to the image and stored in Content Manager.  Finally, Integro helped train Bashas’ on the system and the scanning process.

Results

The entire project was completed on time and under budget.  It is no longer necessary for Bashas’ employees to submit written requests to the records department—all records can now be searched online.  With worker’s compensation claims stored within Content Manager, Bashas’ can pull claims in seconds.

And that’s just the beginning for Bashas’ partnership with Integro.  The company has already contracted Integro to automate their Pharmacy records, and other departments are in line waiting.

Paul Moore, Bashas' DB2 expert, said ‘[Integro] was one of the best groups he had ever worked with and highly recommends them going forward with other departments.’