The repeal of the Civil Rights Law 50-A now grants the public access to the performance records of police officers, firefighters, and prison officers from the public. With this, Police Departments now have to brace for the flood of FOIL/FOIA requests for police disciplinary requests.
Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to respond in a timely manner. Many experience lag time in responding to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Without a solution in place, responding to a request can take a significant amount of time, involving a trip to the records room to locate and copy the requested document(s) within the correct storage box or file cabinet and sending the copy to the requester by mail or scheduling a pickup.
What if there was a solution that could alleviate the stress, time, and cost of the Public Records Request process as a whole? Laserfiche Cloud expedites the process and delivers the requested documents in an efficient, compliant manner. Laserfiche’s key strengths are business process automation, workflow, and document management.
How are other agencies digitizing their Records Requests Process?
Laserfiche Forms
Using Laserfiche Forms, Police Departments can quickly fulfill public records requests in support of compliance of any public records laws that set strict timelines for responding to a request. By collecting public records request information via Laserfiche form, payments can be collected, and notifications can be automatically routed/sent out to the responding department, team members, and citizens as the process progresses.
The requestor fills out an online form with the required and any additional information to submit to the Police Department. Once submitted, the responding department is immediately notified of the new request via email and an email is sent to the requestor stating that the request has been received and will be responded to within a given time period.
The responding department can search for the relevant public records and send them out via direct share. Laserfiche direct share allows content to be shared from the Laserfiche repository with external users by a unique and anonymized URL that they can use to access the files for a limited period of time, with the option of adding password protection.
Laserfiche Forms allows requestors to file requests via a simple online form and inquiries are immediately sent to the relevant department for review and approval. Throughout the forms process, citizens will be notified with status updates of their request by automatic emails. The dashboard also shows managers the status of open requests, how long it takes each staff member to complete their task(s), and the probability of tasks becoming overdue.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What are the benefits of Laserfiche Cloud?
There are numerous benefits of Laserfiche Cloud, as many agencies can attest to. Laserfiche is a scalable platform hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS) with many features and security that can support the initiatives of a team, department, and entire organization. It is very user friendly and customizable to fit your specific business needs.
- Make easy data-driven business decisions
- Securely create, store and send electronic documents within one central repository
- Instantly search and retrieve content with Optical Character Recognition (OCR)
- Improve both internal and external communication
- Improve performance through increased visibility
- Integrate Laserfiche with other business line applications to enhance processes
2. Our records are already digitized, how does Laserfiche differ from what we’re doing now?
Laserfiche stores all of your desired digital content into one secure central repository. This platform offers numerous features and functionality that a local network drive or many document storage solutions do not offer.
- Laserfiche includes robust and granular security options for the entire repository, specific files or folders, users, groups, and roles. You can also restrict features rights, some being the ability to view, add, edit, delete, print, and annotate fields, indexes, and fields/folders to support compliance.
- Documents in Laserfiche are OCRed, allowing users to use full-text search to find context hits within them.
- Automated retention schedules ensure compliance and reduce liability
3. Can Laserfiche Forms accept payment?
Yes, Laserfiche forms can accept payments. If a fee needs to be charged the requested can fill in the necessary information to provide payment for the request.
4. What other agencies use Laserfiche?
There are over 5,000,000 Laserfiche users worldwide across 40,000+ organizations. Laserfiche is certified to the Department of Defense 5015.2 standard. If interested in learning how other Police Departments are using Laserfiche, please contact us and we’d be happy to discuss.
5. Can you explain Laserfiche Direct Share more in-depth?
Laserfiche Direct Share allows users to share documents with external parties in a secure and auditable manner. Users can set an expiration date and password for each shared document, as well as monitor when viewed, opened, or downloaded and revoke access as needed.
About Accelerated Information Systems
Accelerated Information Systems (AIS) is an award-winning professional services firm focused on solving business challenges with software solutions. AIS provides expert guidance, utilizing industry expertise and a strong technical skill set to design, implement, and support enterprise solutions.
AIS provides a full suite of professional services including consulting, solution design, implementation, technical support, data conversion, system integration, training, and project management.
Clients of AIS include State and Local Government, Colleges and Universities, Financial Services (Wealth Management, Investment Advisors, Broker-Dealers), Manufacturers, Not-for-Profit Organizations, TV and Media, and Multi-National Non-Governmental Organizations.
Founded in 2005, AIS is headquartered in New York and is also certified in multiple other states as a Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) and a Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE). In addition to their status as a Platinum Certified Laserfiche Solution Provider and the 2019 Laserfiche Cloud Solution Provider of the Year, AIS is a Microsoft Cloud Silver Certified Partner.
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This limited-time offer includes up to 1,000 Full Users, 100 GB Storage, a Public Portal to publish public documents for those outside of your company, and a Forms Portal to automate forms for internal and external submission.
About Laserfiche
Laserfiche Forms
Laserfiche is the leading global provider of intelligent content management and business process automation. Through powerful workflows, electronic forms, document management, and analytics, the Laserfiche® platform eliminates manual processes and automates repetitive tasks, accelerating how business gets done.
Laserfiche pioneered the paperless office with enterprise content management more than 30 years ago. Today, Laserfiche is innovating with cloud, machine learning, and AI to enable organizations in more than 80 countries to transform into digital businesses. Customers in every industry—including government, education, financial services, and manufacturing—use Laserfiche to boost productivity, scale their business, and deliver digital-first customer experiences.
Laserfiche employees in offices around the world are committed to the company’s vision of empowering customers and inspiring people to reimagine how technology can transform lives.