How to Automate Your Document Scanning Workflow with Xerox MFP Apps
- 6 hours ago
- 9 min read
Your team just spent 20 minutes scanning a stack of supplier invoices, emailing them to themselves, saving them to a shared folder called 'scan001', and then manually typing the figures into your accounting system. Somewhere in that process, one file went to the wrong folder, one figure was keyed incorrectly, and nobody has time to check. This is the daily reality for thousands of UK businesses, and it is entirely avoidable.
The device sitting in your office could already handle every one of those steps automatically. Xerox and Lexmark multifunction printers are exceptional scanners. But without the right apps installed, they are doing a fraction of what they are capable of. Document scanning workflow automation turns your printer from a passive copier into an active part of your business process, saving time, reducing errors and protecting your business from compliance risk.
In this guide, we cover five apps from the Xerox App Gallery that transform what happens after a scan. Each one solves a specific, real business problem. Together, they create a seamless automated document workflow that your team can run from day one.
Already know you want to talk to someone? Contact the team at XOS. We offer a free workflow assessment and will tell you honestly which apps will make the biggest difference for your business.
The Real Cost of Manual Document Processing
Before looking at the solutions, it is worth understanding the scale of the problem. A Forrester study found that knowledge workers spend 30% of their working time searching for and managing information. For a team of ten people, that is the equivalent of three full-time roles doing nothing but handling documents.
The financial cost is significant. The compliance cost can be catastrophic. Under GDPR, a data breach caused by a misfiled document or an un-redacted piece of personal information can result in fines of up to 4% of global annual turnover. For UK businesses, that is not a theoretical risk. It is a question of when, not if, unless your document handling processes are watertight.
Manual document workflows create three categories of risk: filing errors, data entry errors, and data handling errors. Automated document scanning workflows eliminate all three, at the point the document enters your business.
How Xerox ConnectKey and the App Gallery Work
Xerox ConnectKey is the technology platform built into Xerox multifunction printers that allows them to run third-party apps, in the same way a smartphone runs apps from an app store. The Xerox App Gallery is that app store, and it is available on a wide range of Xerox ConnectKey-enabled MFPs and MFDs.
Apps are deployed remotely through the App Gallery portal and appear on the device touchscreen with no engineer visit, no additional servers and no extended IT project. A business can go from deciding to automate its scanning workflow to running that workflow within days.
The four apps below are the ones we recommend most consistently to UK businesses. Each one solves a different problem. Each one delivers measurable return on investment.
4 Xerox App Gallery Apps That Automate Your Document Scanning Workflow
1. Xerox Workflow Central Your All-in-One Document Transformation Hub
The problem: paper documents arrive in your business every day. Contracts, invoices, correspondence, application forms. Each needs to be digitised in a specific format and shared with people who need to edit or search it. Doing this manually is slow. Doing it inconsistently creates version control chaos and compliance gaps.
Workflow Central solves this by providing ten cloud-based document processing workflows accessible directly from your Xerox MFP touchscreen. Scan a document, select the workflow, and the transformation happens automatically.
Convert paper documents into fully editable Word files or searchable PDFs in seconds
Translate documents into over 50 languages for international teams and global correspondence
Automatically strip personally identifiable information from documents before sharing
Convert documents into MP3 audio files to meet accessibility and ADA compliance requirements
Access all workflows from your MFP, PC, tablet or mobile phone, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
The result: documents that arrive as paper leave as the right digital format, routed to the right place, ready for the right person. Your staff stop spending time on conversion tasks and start spending time on work that actually requires human judgment.
View Xerox Workflow Central on the App Gallery: https://appgallery.services.xerox.com/#!/home/app-details/b9ad4781-7457-46d6-a6c6-270b6a3f80e5
2. Xerox Auto Redaction GDPR Compliance Without the Manual Work
The problem: your business handles documents containing personal data every day. Employee records, patient information, client details, legal documents. Before any of these are shared externally, sensitive information must be removed. Manual redaction is slow, expensive and unreliable. Human reviewers miss things. And a single missed piece of personally identifiable information is a potential GDPR breach that could cost you far more than the time saved.
The Xerox Auto Redaction app uses Google's Data Loss Prevention (DLP) technology to automatically identify and remove sensitive personal data from scanned documents, at the device, before the document goes anywhere.
Automatically detects and redacts names, phone numbers, email addresses, National Insurance numbers and dates of birth
Choose from preset GDPR-relevant redaction categories or customise to your specific requirements
Options to fully redact, highlight or underline sensitive data depending on your use case
Preview and approve the redacted output before printing or sending
Purpose-built for legal, healthcare, government, HR and education sectors
The result: every document that leaves your organisation has been checked by AI, not by a tired member of staff at the end of a busy afternoon. GDPR compliance becomes a process, not a prayer.
Concerned about your current approach to data compliance in document handling? Contact us for a free consultation. We will assess your current workflow and recommend the right solution for your sector and document volumes.
View Xerox Auto Redaction on the App Gallery:
3. Connect for Microsoft 365 - Scan Directly to SharePoint and OneDrive
The problem: your organisation uses Microsoft 365 and documents are supposed to live in SharePoint or OneDrive. But in practice, scanned documents end up emailed to personal inboxes, saved to desktop folders or dropped onto a shared drive with a filename that means nothing to anyone six months later. The intended system is not being used because the friction of using it is too high.
Connect for Microsoft 365 removes that friction entirely. It creates a direct connection between your Xerox MFP and your Microsoft cloud environment, so staff can navigate their SharePoint and OneDrive folders from the device touchscreen and scan directly to the correct location.
Scan directly to SharePoint Online document libraries or OneDrive folders from the device touchscreen
Navigate your existing folder structure on the screen before scanning, so documents land in exactly the right place
Supports Single Sign-On via Xerox Workplace Suite for secure, seamless authentication
Works with your existing Microsoft 365 tenancy with no additional infrastructure required
Eliminates email-to-self habits, USB drives and shadow filing systems for good
The result: documents arrive where they are supposed to be, with the right permissions, immediately accessible to the right colleagues. Version control and compliance are handled by SharePoint. The device simply delivers the document there, cleanly and instantly.
The ability to scan to SharePoint directly is one of the most commonly requested features by businesses evaluating multifunction printers. If your team is currently working around this gap,
Connect for Microsoft 365 closes it permanently.
View Connect for Microsoft 365 on the App Gallery: https://appgallery.services.xerox.com/#!/home/app-details/4359bbe7-eb12-49a0-bb23-19302ce0691a
4. AIDA - Intelligent Document Processing That Pays for Itself
The problem: your business receives documents that contain data you need in your systems. Supplier invoices with amounts and reference numbers. Delivery notes with tracking information. Application forms with contact details. Someone has to read each document and type that information into your accounting software, CRM or ERP. That work is expensive, slow and error-prone. And as your business grows, the problem gets worse.
AIDA, which stands for Artificial Intelligence for Document Automation, eliminates manual data entry by reading your scanned documents and extracting the data fields you need, automatically, with high accuracy, and routing that data directly to your business systems.
What makes AIDA genuinely different from traditional OCR solutions is its single-example learning capability. You do not need to build templates or process batches of training documents. Show AIDA one example of a new document type, click on the fields you want extracted, and it learns. Immediately. From that point forward, every document of that type is processed automatically, whether it is from the same supplier or a different one with a different layout.
Extracts invoice numbers, amounts, dates, names, barcodes and more from printed and handwritten documents
Single-example learning with no templates or batch training required
Automatically splits and batches documents fed through the automatic document feeder
Builds relationships between related documents, linking invoices to purchase orders automatically
Integrates directly with SharePoint, OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox, SAP and Xerox ECM products
Quick device pairing via QR code with no complex IT setup required
Winner of the Deep Analysis 2023 Innovation Award, highly rated on G2 and Capterra
The result: data entry that previously took hours is done in seconds with higher accuracy and zero staff time. AIDA typically pays for itself within months through reduced labour costs alone. For high-volume document processing environments, the return on investment can be substantial.
Want to know how much AIDA could save your business specifically? Contact our team for a free workflow assessment. We will look at your document volumes and types and give you a realistic estimate of the time and cost savings available.
View AIDA on the App Gallery: https://appgallery.services.xerox.com/#!/home/app-details/cfd7d744-83fa-4ae4-9d33-0cd9941216c2
What a Complete Automated Scanning Workflow Looks Like in Practice
Here is a real-world example of how these four apps work together in a professional services environment.
A client contract arrives by post. A member of the admin team places it on the Xerox MFP. Workflow Central converts the scan into a fully searchable PDF. Connect for Microsoft 365 routes it directly to the correct SharePoint client folder. AIDA reads the document, extracts the contract value, start date and signatory name, and pushes that data into the firm's CRM. Auto Redaction flags any personal data that would need removing before external sharing.
The member of staff who triggered this workflow has already moved on to the next task. The entire process, from scan to filed and data-captured, took under two minutes and required no manual steps.
That is not a pilot programme or a future aspiration. Every element of that workflow is available today, through the Xerox App Gallery, on devices that many UK businesses already own. The gap between where most organisations are and where they could be is not a technology gap. It is simply an awareness gap.
Is Your Business Ready to Automate Its Document Scanning Workflow?
If any of the following applies to your organisation, document scanning automation could deliver a significant and measurable return:
Staff regularly spend time manually filing, naming or routing scanned documents
Scanned documents frequently end up in the wrong place or with an unhelpful file name
Your business handles personal data and relies on manual checks for GDPR compliance
Documents need to be shared with people who need to search or edit them
Data from scanned documents is being re-keyed manually into accounting, CRM or ERP systems
Device downtime or supply issues regularly disrupt your document processes
You are using Microsoft 365 but scans are still going to email inboxes rather than SharePoint
If you recognise any of those situations, you are not alone. These are the most common document management challenges we hear from businesses across the UK, from small professional services firms to large multi-site organisations. The good news is that all of them are solvable, often faster and more affordably than businesses expect.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Xerox App Gallery?
The Xerox App Gallery is a marketplace of applications designed for Xerox ConnectKey-enabled multifunction printers. Apps are installed remotely and appear on the device touchscreen, extending the capabilities of your MFP well beyond standard print and scan functions. It works in the same way as an app store on a smartphone.
Can I scan directly to SharePoint from a Xerox printer?
Yes. The Connect for Microsoft 365 app, available through the Xerox App Gallery, allows users to scan directly to SharePoint Online document libraries and OneDrive folders from the device touchscreen. No additional IT infrastructure is required and it works with your existing Microsoft 365 tenancy.
How long does it take to set up document scanning automation?
Most Xerox App Gallery apps can be deployed and configured within a day. More complex workflows involving integrations with ERP or CRM systems may take a little longer to implement and test fully, but each app delivers value independently from day one. You do not need to wait for full implementation to start seeing results.
How much do Xerox App Gallery apps cost?
Apps are available on a subscription basis and pricing varies by app and by the number of devices you are deploying to. Contact our team for a quote based on your specific requirements and device estate. We will give you a transparent breakdown with no hidden costs.
What is intelligent document processing?
Intelligent document processing, often abbreviated as IDP, is the use of AI and machine learning to automatically read, classify and extract data from documents. Unlike traditional OCR, which simply converts images of text into text, IDP understands the meaning and context of the information it extracts. AIDA is an example of an IDP solution designed specifically for businesses using Xerox multifunction printers.
Ready to Build a Smarter Document Scanning Workflow?
The technology to automate your document scanning workflow already exists, is proven in thousands of businesses, and is available on hardware you may already own. The only question is whether you are ready to stop doing manually what your devices can do automatically.
At XOS, we help UK businesses design, implement and optimise document scanning workflows using Xerox and Lexmark devices and the apps that power them. We do not just sell hardware. We make sure it is working as hard as possible for your business from day one.
Get in touch today. Visit xosuk.co.uk , call our team, or fill in the contact form and we will get back to you within one working day. We offer a free document workflow assessment for any business interested in scanning automation, with no obligation and no sales pressure. Just an honest conversation about what is possible for your specific situation.
Comments