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The ScerIS Story
Herein lives the story of ScerIS. As we endeavor to create "live" information, this is a living history, maintained to reflect a path from our beginnings to our present state.
The Beginning
The company was incorporated on March 11, 1993 by Jim Walckner to provide electronic document repositories to healthcare, business and government organizations. Jim was enamored with the technology when he first saw it in 1992 and immediately saw the potential for significant business process improvements using this technology at his previous employer, Digital Equipment Corporation. ScerIS has changed since its founding, as its focus has expanded to include solutions that address business process optimization with a wide perspective.
In the beginning, most of the company’s work involved document scanning, COLD (Computer Output to Laser Disk) and automated data capture systems. Technologies were combined into composite solutions to address the business needs of our clients. To accomplish this, the company resold numerous products including FileNet, Optech, Teamworks and more, including some custom implementations. For recognition systems, ScerIS resold the Microsystems Technology products (now known as AnyDoc), which the company considers to this day to be a “best of breed” product. The AnyDoc application suite is included in the company’s composite solution offerings. Our role in selecting these products was to help each customer assemble and implement a solution that exactly met their requirements.
That was then….
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The First Customers
The Company’s first customer was Consolidated Group Trust (CGT), a third party administrator (insurance benefits management). Of the 15 vendors evaluated, we stood out as the only vendor that designed a solution to meet CGT’s requirement involving Xerox Metacode Forms in an electronic repository solution. Shortly after the CIO selected us, this solution was rolled out to 125 customer service personnel who could directly relate to customer inquiries as the data on the screen was in the exact format the customer saw on paper. Communication between the parties was simplified. Call backs were virtually eliminated as the information was available instantly and the customer was serviced on their inbound call. Eliminating the need for call backs saved over $6,000 per month in phone charges in addition to all the savings of employees’ time.
Almost immediately following CGT, St. Vincent’s Hospital purchased a system to manage all the print file output from their proprietary billing system and source documents for the Patient Accounting Department. One of their biggest problems had been the purge of “zero balance accounts” which was managed with paper print-outs. The system selected for St. Vincent’s automated indexing of purge files to the account level, which meant that patient accounting employees could retrieve purged data for a specific patient in about 1 second.
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Building the Service Center
Perhaps the most notable work in the first year occurred when a client (not one of the clients named above) that was using the company for complex automation systems called and asked if we could automate a process to extract fields of information from 1,400,000 voting proxy documents. The service center was created. Servers, scanners, PCs and recognition technologies were purchased and installed. A semi truck arrived at our small office, and several hours later there was barely a place to walk for all the boxes. Staffing was hired for three shifts seven days a week from several temporary staffing agencies. Just 4 ½ weeks later, all the documents had been processed and summaries created that validated the client’s summary data.
This provided the company with scanning capability for about 135,000 pages per day.
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Acquisition of Information Bridge Technologies
In February 1995, the opportunity arose to acquire a software company that produced document imaging and COLD (Computer Output to Laser Disk) applications. Shortly thereafter, customer-centric ideals were redefined and reapplied as product changes that previously required months or years to acquire through software vendors were now available to our customers in days or weeks. Our customers are our priority, and as such their needs take precedence with our software development team. Even with the much greater planning involved in software development efforts at the company today, the customer’s needs continue to be addressed as quickly as possible.
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Growth & Development
Management Team
- Jim Walckner, founder. Jim is the President & CEO.
- Jan Sickenberger, who joined the company in 1996. Jan was previously with Fallon Clinic, a customer. Nine years after joining us, Jan became Division President of Healthcare Solutions.
- Dan Furbush, who joined the team in 2000. Dan now manages our business unit serving businesses and government entities and is Division President of ScerIS Informatics.
- Joe Havelick, who joined the company in 2004. In 2008, Joe became the company’s Chief Technology Officer. Joe is responsible for technological innovation and application development.
- John Nelson, who in 2008 joined ScerIS as the Vice President of Operations. With an impressive background in technology and business, John is a tremendous asset to our customers. He is responsible for consulting services, other professional services, customer support and our outsourcing operations.
- Pat Pollard, who joined the company in 2009 as Vice President – Insurance Solutions. Pat has over 25 years experience in process improvement in insurance companies and leads the company’s practice enabling insurance clients with enterprise-wide process optimization.
- Karen Latzka, who joined the company in 2009 as Corporate Controller.
- Lori Granger, who joined ScerIS in 2010 as Vice President – Hospital Solutions. Lori’s background in helping hospitals with operational efficiencies providing bottom line savings brings great value to our hospital clients nationally.
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Products & Services
The company is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner and the company’s products are Microsoft .NET based applications. This is important, because this development environment helps us deliver more functionality faster and at a reduced development cost for our customers. We are also able to bring customer unique requirements into product releases faster and provide rapid deployment of changes and upgrades, not to mention how well this environment helps to protect our customers’ information.
The company’s products include:
- Applications targeting business processes in 15 industries.
- Custom applications (Design and Development).
- Easily configured robust applications for document management, electronic report management, process and document workflow, automated data capture, electronic document archival, automated records retention management and integration to host applications.
The company’s services include:
- Professional services for process evaluation, identification of process optimization and implementation of applicable solutions.
- Service center operations that provide Business Process Outsourcing (BPO services) associated with system conversions, and document, microfilm, microfiche, radiology film scanning and indexing services, and process outsourcing services associated with A/P, A/R, HR, Medical Records, Claims Processing, General Scanning & Indexing, Survey Processing, and Litigation Support.
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Customers
Throughout this timeframe we secured relationships with many new customers and have expanded the relationships over time. In about 40 percent of our implementations, we find that we are replacing prior technology investments where our prospects have determined that the solutions they purchased don’t meet their current or planned needs.
A partial list of customers who are more noteworthy because they have received national recognition for their work with us includes:
Alamo Rent-A-Car
Recipient of a Process Innovation Award from Kinetic Information.
Installation received national honors as the top document management solution in transportation. Over 2,000 agents, 6,000 agent employees and Alamo employees around the globe access travel voucher information and rental agreements on-line through our web based solution. This solution automatically stores 32.5 million additional documents annually; and provided Alamo Rent-A-Car a cost savings of $1.3 million annually.
State University of New York – Stonybrook – Clinical Practice Management Plan (CPMP)
Recipient of a Process Innovation Award from Kinetic Information.
Installation received national honors as the top document management solution in education. Clinical Practice Management Plan implemented document imaging and ScerIS CAP2 (automated payment posting system for EOB processing). The system saved countless hours researching payment information in payment batches, and hours of work at copier machines. The redesign of mailroom activities, payment posting and bank deposits resulted in automated and streamlined processes. Additional systems were installed for Finance, Human Resources, Legal, and Physician Credentialing.
Commonwealth of Massachusetts – Public Safety – Firearms Records Bureau
Recipient of the Vision Award from Kinetic Information and AIIM
Our solution with the Commonwealth was nationally recognized as the top document management initiative with the most potential for the greatest social impact. This system has saved countless lives. One of several solutions for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, this solution tracks the ownership of firearms. The cost of gun traces when performed manually was about $5,600 each. After the implementation of this system that cost was reduced to just $.09 each. The system has been used to identify over 35,000 disqualified license holders which resulted in over 7,400 revoked licenses, confiscation of over 8,500 guns, and 1,200 arrests. The system is integral to providing police officers with on-line information about gun ownership (useful when responding to calls such as domestic violence or certain emergencies).
Northwood Health Systems
Recipient of a Process Innovation Award – Kinetic Information
This solution received national honors as the top document management initiative in all of healthcare - achieving a 142% Internal Rate of Return. Additionally this solution was recognized by AIIM and Business Solutions Magazine as an innovative solution to real world problems. The redesign of business processes, medical records processes and the introduction of electronic forms all contributed to the success of image enabling the medical records at Northwood’s thirty locations. This solution eliminated five records management locations (originally six consolidation locations across the health system), identified lost revenue, and authenticated supporting detail for billings (mitigating negative Medicare/Medicaid audit findings). The index values for all stored documents are automatically validated for 100 percent accuracy. Today, Northwood is considered one of the most financially sound institutions of its type.
There are more awards, but perhaps more notable is our client list. Although there are some well known names in this list, some names are not printed due to confidentiality agreements. It is certainly a compliment that these and other companies have chosen to work with us. The skill set of our people and the diversity of our work is obviously quite broad. Below is a partial list of organizations we helped over these years:
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Now
Today the company has many years of experience helping to strengthen and recession proof organizations spanning 15 major vertical markets across America and internationally. We help organizations maintain service levels while reducing costs and avoiding future costs. Some customers achieve heightened levels of sales and others see reduced costs or improved asset management. The company’s applications help customers achieve their intended business process improvements and optimizations with minimal cost. The company provides:
- rapidly deployed business process optimization solutions and
- business process outsourcing services.
Through these many years we have enjoyed some incredible experiences and continue to find challenging situations to tackle. Our team has kept its entrepreneurial drive for creativity and continues to develop new solutions to optimize work processes.
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