Case Study

Hospital Gains Satisfaction and Savings with New Outsourced Workplace Services

As an acclaimed, multi-hospital health system anchored by a leading academic medical center, this ARO customer is trusted by millions of patients every year. Unfortunately, internal customers didn’t have the same level of trust in the hospital’s print center or mailroom—until ARO stepped in to help.

Client Snapshot

813-bed hospital complex spanning multiple states in the Southeastern USA

6,300 end users in the corporate office, network, and charitable foundation

Was contracting with an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) for print center and printer fleet management; mailroom operations were insourced

Wide variety of print requirements: Standard print and document management, hospital signage, medical forms, legal documents, print collateral, and more

The Challenge

A ‘Very Broken Relationship’ with Most Departments

Under the previous vendor’s mismanagement of the print center, hospital employees reported being unhappy with customer service to the point of actively avoiding in-person visits. The print center also lacked any coordination with the closely related functions of the insourced mailroom. The hospital turned to ARO to rebuild these relationships—as well as unlock new levels of customer satisfaction and cost savings. ARO’s in-depth review uncovered urgent issues, including:

Poor Communication

The previous print center vendor often outright turned down complex jobs without explanation. Jobs they did accept came back late or with shoddy quality control—without prior communication to work through these issues.

Pricey Outside Printing

Burned by missed deadlines and inconsistent print quality, the departments with the greatest print needs (marketing, executive, and the foundation) were sending many jobs off site—where printing costs were 60% higher on average.

Missing Packages & Paperwork

Mailroom customers reported packages, checks, and patient items missing on a weekly basis, with no tracking accountability for these crucial errors.

Insufficient Cost Controls

Only standard envelopes were being metered as pre-sort, leading to excessive costs and a lack of tracking for flats and packages.

Lack of Capabilities Awareness

Despite having a fully equipped print/copy center on site, even the departments that did use the print/copy center were still unaware of the facility’s full capabilities.

Excessive Equipment Downtime

Toner and other consumables were often out of stock for the hospital’s distributed multifunction printer fleet across multiple campuses, and the response to break/fix issues was slow.

The ARO Approach

Active Communication Clears the Way to Efficient Service

The ARO team engaged leaders in the departments with the greatest print needs. We could quickly see that the main pressure points stemmed from poor communication, a lack of coordination between print center and mailroom operations, and a resulting lack of trust.

To begin restoring trust, we immediately raised the standards of communication and transparency. The ARO account manager initiated proactive, weekly sit-downs with department directors, first listening and then offering realistic solutions.

“ARO works closely with us on a regular basis to make sure that we are kept up to date with any pertinent information to our department that may impact our own ability to work effectively. This includes potential inventory issues, equipment issues, cost-saving opportunities and even giving us expert insight into the production side that we never had before, which allows us to tailor our workflow to better synergize with theirs—thereby creating a more efficient, cost-effective, and exemplary experience, resulting in a better final product.”  - Marketing & Public Relations Coordinator

Key Solutions

Copy Center-Mailroom Service Alignment

Brought the mail and print/copy center under one management umbrella and cross-trained employees.
Provided a central hub for pickup and deploying hospital couriers to deliver print products to customers, at no additional cost to the hospital.

Multifunction Printer (MFP) Fleet Management

Monitored and replenished fleet consumables daily.
Aligned stocking levels to forecasted usage.
Performed regularly scheduled preventative maintenance.

Key Performance Indicator Improvement

Implemented the AROworks digital platform to focus on measuring and optimizing cost savings, customer satisfaction, and other essential metrics.
Instituted regular reporting on print center and mailroom operations, with a focus on cost-saving initiatives.

Proactive Print Services Marketing

Connected with department heads, supply chain, and administrators to keep everyone informed of copy center capabilities and built-in cost saving potential.
Expanded services to better serve customers while saving costs.

spotlight

A Challenge That ‘Would Have Sent a Normal Team Running for the Hills’

The hospital’s foundation reached out to ARO with less than a month before the shipping deadline for their annual Impact Report: a job involving thousands of units of personalized, hand-folded gloss paper in sealed envelopes.

Tackling this huge challenge with urgency and enthusiasm, we delivered two days earlier than required. We also did so under budget, by achieving cost savings including:

Negotiating a special per-case price for the gloss paper stock.
Identifying an opportunity to shrink the typeface by 1pt and images by 5%, thus reducing the sheets required per mailer from 3 to 2.
Running each piece as standard mail (thanks to reduced weight and thickness).

This project “would have sent a normal print team running for the hills. The ARO team, however, was able to meet the challenge head-on, finding creative solutions that allowed the project to hit the mail stream on time and well under budget by capitalizing on some previously unnoticed cost saving opportunities! It is such a pleasure to work with this team!” - Director of Development, Annual Giving

Results

Delighting All Departments and Delivering at Lower Costs

Since 2021, we’ve overseen a 13% year-over-year increase in usage volume for both the copy center and mailroom. With this growth comes cost savings and other advantages built into ARO processes:

Improved Communication and Trust

Relationships with key departments and stakeholders have flourished. Trust in all ARO operations has exceeded expectations.

Reduced Outside Printing Costs by 60%

In-house printing instead of sending work to outside vendors has delivered significant savings. We’ve also increased the opportunities for those savings by expanding into business cards and other print services. The hospital will continue to save money every time they use our services.

Real-Time Tracking

Using AROworks for package tracking provides continuous visibility of all accountable items and builds communication between the mailroom and receiving dock.

Stronger Cost Controls

Cost and volume reporting in AROworks allows for better control and decision making. For example, postage for personal packages is now processed through presort for proper tracking of private shipping costs.

Greater Awareness and Utilization

End users are more aware of and have more trust in our services—helping to increase volume (by 13% year-over-year since 2021) that would have otherwise gone to external vendors at a higher cost.

Improved MFP Fleet Uptime

Timely first responder deployment and regularly scheduled preventative maintenance have allowed the fleet to average a monthly 99.3% uptime.

“Not only does the ARO print center provide the quality and turnaround we expect, but they are able to do so with a level of professionalism and quality that shows that they are equally as invested in the final product, and the image that places upon our organization, as we are!” - Director of Business Development