Centralizing Copiers Run the Show...But Get Help

The in-plant manager must be the one to initiate the process of consolidating copier/RFD contracts.

By Carol Brzozowski

Renegotiating copier contracts is not a solo project. In-plant managers will quickly find they need the help of the Information Technology (IT) and purchasing departments. But it's important that the in-plant manager spearheads the effort.

"IT people may know networking, but beyond that, they typically don't have any interest in this," says Chuck Fahnestock, copy coordinator at Wright State University. "Vending people may be adept at handling coin-operated and public walk-up machines, but they probably don't want to do anything more than contract with somebody from the outside. The in-plant people are the ones who use copying and paper and focus on image quality and production and usability day in and day out, so their focus is more on delivering the product and service to the customer more than the other groups would be."

Patrick O'Donnell, manager of Document Production Services for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Michigan, says if an in-plant has a good copier/MFD program, the manager will "look like a valuable player within the company."

Still, you can't do it alone, he says.

"You really need purchasing or procurement to be heavily involved with the negotiations," he says.

In the case of BCBS, O'Donnell's department set the vendor criteria—what the vendor had to do to provide service—and IT set the criteria for technology issues. After that, O'Donnell's department and purchasing met with the vendors.

O'Donnell also worked closely with the company's IT team in the installation and training process.

"You get into network issues, print issues and scan issues," he says. "The IT people made sure we got machines compatible with our environment and that can work within our network. We gave procurement a list of items the vendor had to agree to do even before they could supply us a bid."

That list included an on-site technician, unlimited training and failed machine replacement in a structured time period, among other factors.

From the vendors that agreed to those terms, Purchasing selected four vendors, and through on-site visits, the team narrowed the number to two and requested competitive bids.

"We chose the vendor we thought would do the best job based on what we thought was important," O'Donnell says. "It wasn't necessarily always the lowest price."

And sometimes, when the leader in the effort is from the purchasing department, lowest price can be the sole criteria—and an ill-advised one at that.

"It takes somebody who knows the difference between what the equipment can do and the needs of the users to effectively integrate a process like this," says Fahnestock. "Everybody submitting a quotation will tell you they can do everything flawlessly, which, unfortunately, is not always the case. You really need to have people in the information technology networking group and people familiar with imaging involved to make this as seamless and user-friendly as possible."

Nor should IT be solely in charge, O'Donnell adds.

"IT people are great in selecting technology and products, but once they put the product or the technology in, they walk away and then you work with the help desk. Because this is what we do for a living, we put things in the contract other people might not put in."

Case in point: O'Donnell always insists on unlimited training.

"If, on one of our main campuses, we have a lot of downtime on one of our MFDs, we'll start talking to the service technician to find out if it's a training issue," he says. "Then we'll talk to the vendor about retraining that floor again to get rid of these downtime issues.

"When we put in MFDs, we set up training classes all over the state," he adds. "Purchasing and IT people are not staffed to do this, nor do I see why they would want to. But with us, this is what we do."

This story appeared as a sidebar to the story "Get Wise: Centralize" in the printed edition.