Tanner Construction Leaves the Heavy Lifting to Epson WorkForce Pro GT-S50 Scanners

LONG BEACH, Calif., June 9, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Tanner Construction Company, Inc., the largest highway and heavy-construction company in Mississippi, is using fast and reliable Epson WorkForce™ Pro GT-S50 scanners in its corporate offices to capture and back up enormous quantities of documents. Overall use of the scanners has improved efficiencies and productivity in the company's record-keeping system while significantly reducing its paper use.

"With about $95 million in new contracts this year, payables can run about $4 million per month, which means tracking a lot of invoices from different vendors," said Randall West, an accountant at Tanner, headquartered in Laurel, Miss. "Since we started using the Epson GT-S50 two years ago, we've cut our overall paper usage down by about one-third."    

Tanner employs 260 workers at construction sites throughout the state, using heavy-duty equipment like bulldozers, dump trucks and excavators to move tons of earth. A day's work in the field might include asphalt paving, bridge construction and structural concrete, drainage structures, utility and excavation work, site development or selling construction materials. Back at the corporate office, 15 employees run the main hub for design revisions, project feedback, budgeting, permitting, construction issues, change orders and billing.  

Heavy Workload, Less Paper

To better manage the heavy workload for its government and industry clients, the construction company purchased 10 Epson WorkForce Pro GT-S50 scanners for the engineering, human resources and accounting departments.  Before the new era in high-speed scanner convenience, workers shared a single scanner in a centralized area, but the machine couldn't keep up with the high volume. "To save time and money, we thought it made better sense to put a scanner on individual desks," said West. The Epson scanners have proven to be very reliable and are used frequently by busy project managers, estimators, administrators, accounts receivable, accounts payable, and office assistants.  

Whether working to build a new bridge or repave a highway, staff can easily scan stacks of documents in the 75-page Auto Document Feeder, using a front control panel with up to 10 user-definable scan jobs, including scan-to-PDF and email. The high-speed Epson WorkForce Pro GT-S50 can scan up to 25 pages and 50 images per minute, plus a high-volume duty cycle of up to 1,200 sheets per day. "The accounting department now saves the time it used to spend retrieving and filing paper, and as a result is running much more efficiently," said West.

Better Efficiency, Productivity

From the moment a job begins, project managers scan in the initial contract documents, supplemental agreements, and monthly pay estimates. Subcontractor documents and all accounts payable invoices are also scanned, tracking purchases ranging from nails, plyboard and two-by-fours to fuel, concrete and structural steel. They transform all monthly and final client estimates into digital files, and then close out the job with the final acceptance and maintenance release scans.

With two-sided duplex scanning and automatic paper size detection, the Epson GT-S50 also allows them to scan anything else that relates to the job, including documents up to 8.5x36 inches, business cards and rigid ID cards. All scanned documents are there for easy access, sending, editing, and filing, so each phase of the project runs efficiently, with speedy communications between all on the project team.  

"Since the Epson GT-S50 scanner came to our office, we've noticed that time-consuming paper jams are now a thing of the past," said West. The scanner's mercury-free ReadyScan™ LED technology also does away with warm-up time and automatically turns off in standby mode. The staff also finds it easy to manage documents with the software, including TWAIN and EMC ISIS drivers, plus PDF, OCR, document management, and business card management software.  

Ready for the Heavy Lifting

Founded in 1977 by president and owner Gary C. Tanner, Tanner Construction has grown from one bulldozer and dump truck to a fully diversified and vertically integrated contractor.  "We can point to hundreds of projects that we are proud to have built, including the Liberty Bridge in Natchez, Collins Bypass, Highway 84 in Waynesboro, the Big Bay Lake Dam, and the Stateline Bridge," said West.   "Now with the help of the Epson GT-S50 scanner, our day-to-day operations run more smoothly, helping us fast-track any type of construction project.

For more information about the Epson WorkForce Pro GT-S50 document scanner, please visit www.epson.com.  For more about Tanner Construction, please visit www.tannerconstruction.net.

About Epson

Epson is a global imaging and innovation leader dedicated to exceeding the vision of customers worldwide through its compact, energy-saving, high-precision technologies, with a wide lineup ranging from printers and 3LCD projectors for business, and the home, to electronic and crystal devices. Led by the Japan-based Seiko Epson Corporation, the Epson Group comprises nearly 75,000 employees in 100 countries around the world. Epson is proud of its ongoing contributions to the global environment and the communities in which it operates and has been named to the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index, an indicator for leading companies in economic, environmental and social criteria, for the third year in a row. Epson America, Inc. based in Long Beach, Calif. is Epson's regional headquarters for the U.S., Canada, and Latin America. To learn more about Epson, please visit: www.Epson.com. You may also connect with Epson America on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/EpsonAmerica), Twitter (http://twitter.com/EpsonAmerica) and (http://twitter.com/EpsonEducation) and YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/EpsonTV).

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SOURCE Epson