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A busy city council reaps the rewards of replacing its antiquated printer and analogue photocopier fleet with the latest imageRUNNER multifunction devices At a glance Supporting a growing city The selection process Trying before buying Speed is king At a glance City of West Torrens Council Industry Local Government Geographies Hilton, South Australia Canon Products Used 2xiR C3200, 3x iR3320i. "With the Canon imageRUNNERs onboard, a job that used to take almost two days is now done in a matter of hours." Jesse Iannone, Systems Officer, City of West Torrens The City of West Torrens Council is an extremely busy business hub and the centre of the West Torrens community on the outskirts of Adelaide. For more than 150 years, the Council has overseen one of the largest employment centres in Adelaide, with the Adelaide Airport, the major interstate rail terminal and major sporting facilities all under its watch.  Supporting a growing city As a Council governing any growing city knows, the need to service the community in a timely and cost effective manner is paramount. In early 2004, staff at the City of West Torrens came to the agreement that in order to work smarter, more efficiently and meet the growing demands of the community, it needed to revamp its existing copying and printing network. "In general, staff members were spending far too much time waiting for large jobs to print," said Jesse Iannone, Systems Officer, City of West Torrens. "We needed to find a cost effective printing and copying solution that met the Council's business requirements, as well asimproved efficiency." Before implementing its new solution, staff at the City of West Torrens primarily worked with a combination of networked laser printers and, in some cases, personal printers attached to workstations. As time progressed, the Council eventually had 25 black and white laser printers sitting on the desks of staff members, in addition to the networked laser printers and some analogue black and white photocopiers. The selection process While the Council's printing and copying requirements differed from day to day, it regularly involved printing material such as internal memos, 250-page agendas that needed to be photocopied and bound - sometimes up to 30 times - as well as a selection of in-house designed publications. Such printing scenarios were not being covered adequately by the existing array of small laser printers and old analogue photocopiers. In a bid to see how other businesses and organisations had overcome similar problems, Mr Iannone decided to look beyond the Council walls. "We researched other organisations, such as the City of Charles Sturt, to see if their set-up was effective and if it could be duplicated here," said Mr Iannone. "Like West Torrens, Charles Sturt staff previously had printers on their desks in addition to a photocopier to produce everything." As part of the its solution, the City of Charles Sturt decided to consolidate its printer fleet by exchanging its analogue photocopiers for efficient networked multifunction devices - which also eliminated the need for personal printers and networked laser printers. As this system had worked well for the Council, Mr Iannone decided to draft a tender along similar lines. Trying before buying As one of the companies invited to take part in the tender process, Canon immediately offered the City of West Torrens an obligation-free multifunction device for a two-week period, knowing that its final solution would both involve such a device, and that the device would be quite foreign to Council staff. The Council agreed to the trial as it enabled staff to try the equipment and to see, firsthand, the benefits of using a multifunction device and how it could make their working life easier. "Good service certainly makes a difference," said Mr Iannone. "A Canon representative came to the Council's civic centre and showed the staff all the features of the device, such as scanning to PDF and sending to email, ensuring that everyone was comfortable with the equipment." Staff of the City of West Torrens were initially sceptical in relinquishing their smaller printers, but once they started using the Canon device, they realised that the benefits such as fast printing and scanning to PDF far outweighed the benefits of having access to their own single function, basic black and white printers. "We really wanted to ensure that the staff were happy with multifunction devices before introducing any new changes," said Mr Iannone. "Instead of us telling them this is what we wanted to do, we actually let them try first and see the benefits of the machine. Naturally, they were happy with the devices and, in turn, it was much easier for them to make the transition when the time came." Once the two-week trial period was over, a Canon consultant removed the device, reviewed the City of West Torrens' business requirements and the feedback from the trial, finally recommending two imageRUNNER iR C3200 colour devices and three imageRUNNER iR3320i black and white units - a total of five multifunction devices. Mr Iannone then hired an external consultant to review all the tender documents. After thorough research of his own, the external consultant concluded that Canon's business solutions and suggested models were the most efficient and cost effective to meet the Council's needs. Speed is king In an office where there is a high turnover of documents, speed is of the upmost importance. On a monthly basis, the City of West Torrens prints 75,000 prints across the five machines. This is a significant amount of output, especially as large documents - which include attachments - are regularly developed and printed in-house. Apart from the large number of prints, the City of West Torrens' staff members also produce lengthy agendas on a regular basis. "An agenda can take four days to be developed, this includes revisions and sign-offs," said Mr Iannone. "But, as usual, in a business environment deadlines are pushed back, putting pressure on the people who have to print them,". With the Canon imageRUNNERs onboard, a job that used to take almost two days is now done in a matter of hours." While too early to do a ROI analysis, Mr Iannone confidently states that the benefits are well and truly evident. "We have seen the difference the machines have made to everyone's working environment," said Mr Iannone. Related Links
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