The Association of Records Managers and Administrators (ARMA), in their document on RIM Fundamentals, provide an excellent answer to the question: What are records?

Their answer:
“Records are the evidence of what the organization does. They capture its business activities and transactions, such as contract negotiations, business correspondence, personnel files, and financial statements, just to name a few.”

It can be safely said, that if an event of consequence has taken place in your organization, then there is a record containing its details. Records are both valuable and expensive. They are used to both advance and defend an organization and its activities. They are a double-edged sword that can either exonerate, or incriminate, when not properly managed. It is, therefore, equally important that records are immediately located when necessary; and that they are promptly destroyed as the law allows.

The suite of Records Management software products from RMS Answers, Inc. can provide the features needed to ensure that every phase of the life cycle of your organization’s records is under your complete control.

• Find files quickly – Whether you need to locate a file, print a label, or fill a storage box, RMS provides the ability to sort and filter your records database so that you can complete the task as quickly as possible.
• Track file movement history – Files can be checked out from a file room computer, or at your desk. RMS reports show the movement history of any item, and provide the ability to list just those files that are checked-out.
• Integrate with color barcode labeling systems – RMS software integrates with industry-standard packages such as Colorbar, and Intaglio.
• Manage storage box inventory – When integrated with your Records Retention Schedule (RRS), RMS products help you to ensure that only the items with like destruction review dates are boxed together.
• Search and report based on any field – It’s never been easier to respond to those three awful questions that always get asked by that person who has just arrived at your desk. “Do we have anything pertaining to ABC?” “What do we have?” “Can you print out a list?” The powerful and convenient search features of RMS software products make it quick and easy to search within your department, or your entire organization; on the shelf, or in a storage box at your offsite storage facility.

RMS Professional is designed to support the volume needs and budgets of departments at a single site. RMS Professional includes all of the same features and capabilities of its “big brothers” RMS Enterprise and RMS Web, including the ability to synchronize data collected from RMS Mobile systems.

• Support for multiple departments
• Security levels for System-, Site-, and Department-level administrators
• Multiple security levels within a department including read-only access
• Records Retention Schedule (RRS) functionality to enable RMS Pro to calculate destruction review dates according to your RRS
• Support for multiple RRS versions
• Integrated color barcode label printing
• Does not require a database server for operation

RMS Enterprise extends the performance threshold of RMS Professional by utilizing a SQL database server to maintain a fast response when dealing with large data volumes. RMS Enterprise is intended for widespread use in an office tower or campus environment.

• Support for multiple departments
• Security levels for System-, Site-, and Department-level administrators
• Multiple security levels within a department including read-only access
• Records Retention Schedule (RRS) functionality to enable RMS Enterprise to calculate destruction review dates according to your RRS
• Support for multiple RRS versions
• Integrated color barcode label printing

For the ultimate in ease of deployment and maximum availability – nothing beats RMS Web. RMS Web is a full-featured, high performance, full-fledged member of the RMS family of records management systems. The only workstation components required for RMS Web are a web browser and a PDF file reader. RMS Web has been specifically designed to handle the performance challenges associated with organization that are spread across many different locations.

• Support for multiple departments
• Security levels for System-, Site-, and Department-level administrators
• Multiple security levels within a department including read-only access
• Records Retention Schedule (RRS) functionality to enable RMS Web to calculate destruction review dates according to your RRS
• Support for multiple RRS versions
• Integrated color barcode label printing
• Ease of implementation – workstations only need a browser and a PDF reader
• Shared licensing with RMS Enterprise – your organization can use any combination of RMS Web and RMS Enterprise
• Full RMS functionality – every function and feature available on RMS Answers’ desktop products is available with RMS Web

When your records management tasks require you to “go where the action is”, RMS Mobile is the tool you need. RMS Mobile runs on hand-held computers and synchronizes to your records and box inventory. Now, you can carry your entire inventory in your pocket.

• Perform Check-In/Check-Out operations – Now you can catch up with all of those people who like to raid the file room “after hours”. With RMS Mobile, you can quickly scan the files on their desk, chair, and/or floor.
• Reassign Locations of Folders and Boxes – This is a huge help when file rooms are split, or boxes move from an on-site staging area to an offsite storage location.
• Renumber Boxes with Storage Vendor Barcodes – RMS software products generate their own box numbers which enables anyone to create a new storage box without waiting for storage vendor labels. RMS Mobile provides a convenient tool for replacing the internally-generated number with the storage vendor’s number.