Papercut - Charging Departments Back

[Joko]

Hi all.

 

I am wanting to send off the usage reports to Finance. Now departments will be charged back, should i reset all the counters to zero? What is best practice. I assume if i reset back to zero this could mess something up in reporting later down the line?

 

What do you do?

 

Thanks,

 

Joe.

[Jawloms]

Set up an automated monthly usage report to go to designated email addresses.

[Sibrows]

Just be careful that the reports and the billing match up. We're using Papercut with RICOH printers and the two reports never match by several thousand copies!

 

We've flagged it with RICOH who've told us; "PaperCut is more of a print management tool and not an accounting solution". Not impressed.

[MatthewL]

There will always be a difference in what a machines reads to what PaperCut shows as anything done outside of PaperCut i.e. direct prints or engineers prints add to the total but don't go through PaperCut. Also depending when the company takes their readings won't be when you report is exactly.

 

To answer the first question, you don't need to reset anything, PaperCut will just add on but an automated monthly report will show the usage for that period specified. A number of schools I have worked in get the reports send to the HoD then they can chase their staff that are using too much and a summary of accounts and not staff is sent to finance for those who bill out.

[mdrabble]

Automated monthly reports are the way to go.

 

I sent monthly breakdowns to head of departments so they can see who is printing/copying within their department (Helps when they try an complain how much they are being charged for printing)

 

I also send monthly billing reports to our repro person who sorts out the billing for departments.

[robyholmes]

We work ours in credit. So each half term the HoD gets an email stating how much they have, what they spent and how much they have in their main budget. They then reply with how much they want to put on printing.

 

Really makes them think when they see all the costs in one place. And when they run out they have to go to finance to ask for more.

[MartinT]

I never reset the counters, just forward a termly report giving usage by department going back to the first date of term.

[CalmBlueOcean]

We send out monthly automated reports to head of departments, as well as providing a manually calculated monthly breakdown to our Finance department. We run two reports - one for individuals (staff only, as students are tightly restricted anyway), one for departments (listed as 'Accounts' in Papercut), of which all individuals are assigned to one or more (if they work across multiple subjects, they get the Account choice selection when printing or copying).

 

Mind you, as stated, the two reports never match up to the exact amount, for a variety of reasons. It's always out by a bit, but not enough to be a problem to our Finance department. They control who gets what budget, and deal with departments directly if they are spending too much.